The rebuild of earthquake- battered Christchurch and the surrounding Canterbury region has helped boost activity in the New Zealand construction industry to its highest in five years, the government statistics agency announced Tuesday.

A total of 5,213 building consents for new homes were issued in the June quarter, the most since the June 2008 quarter, according to Statistics New Zealand.

"The seasonally adjusted number of new houses, including apartments, was up 16 percent in the June quarter. The trend for the number of new houses consented has been rising for the last two years and is now similar to the level five years ago," industry and labor statistics manager Blair Cardno said in a statement.

The total value of all building work consented in the June quarter was 2.9 billion NZ dollars (2.32 billion U.S. dollars), with residential building consents at 1.9 billion NZ dollars and planned non-residential work at 1 billion NZ dollars.

The quarterly trend for the total value of building consents was at its second-highest ever level since it peaked in the June 2007 quarter.

"The quarterly trend for the value of non-residential building work has been increasing for a year and is now at its highest level since September 2009," Cardno said.

Together, New Zealand's most populous region of Auckland and Canterbury approved 55 percent of the national total building consents in June alone. Endi

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)