Construction picks up in Estonia in 2016

After two years of decline, construction in Estonia picked up again in 2016 as Estonian builders at both home and abroad increased their output by 3.0 percent year-on-year to 2.1 billion euros (2.2 billion U.S. dollars), according to the latest data released by Statistics Estonia.

Construction of buildings by Estonian firms increased by 9.0 percent to 1.4 billion last year from 2015, and the value of engineering structures built by Estonians in 2016 was 656 million euros, up 10 percent from the previous year.

While Estonia's domestic construction sector was affected by a slowdown in civil engineering and renovation and reconstruction of buildings, construction of new buildings, which has been showing growth since 2013, continued to quicken also in 2016, the statistics office said.

Estonian builders' operations in foreign countries, which made up 11 percent of the sector's total output in 2016, rose by 3.0 percent last year.

With demand for good quality apartments and homes remaining strong in Estonia, the number of construction permits for such projects rose by 8.0 percent year-on-year to 6,021.

The number of new dwellings completed during the year increased by 763 against 2015 to 4,732 in 2016, most of them situated in Tallinn and Tartu. Endit