WHAT'S NEW

Non-Residential Ecomomy Looking Up

09/01/03

After several years of negative growth in the non-residential markets, Reed Business Informationâ??s construction spending forecast for the remainder of 2003 shows welcome gains in both the non-residential and residential industrial and institutional areas.

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Industrial spending, coming off a down trend of â??8.7% for 2001 and â??24.1 for 2002 has been predicted to achieve a growth of +11.3% in 2003.

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Institutional spending, while never falling to the depths of the industrial segment any time during the last ?? years is forecast to show strong growth in the year ahead. Up 10.9% for 2003 â?? as compared to 7.2% in 20?? and 7.8% in 2002. The largest growth area in this sector continues to be both private and public education with the public sector seeing the most growth â?? with a forecast up 18.2% in 2003 as compared to a positive ?? 11.8 in 2001 and 13.9 in 2002.

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Non-residential construction spending as a whole is slated to increase 8.7% in 2003 as compared to a â??4.1? rate for 2002 and 0.4% increase in 2001. Work these growth sectors to gain the greatest success.