Mawlamyine, October (15)
Even though it is in the pre winter period, the construction industry in cannot resume due to the skyrocketed price of construction materials”, said by the local construction business owner.
Within one and a half year period of military coup, many construction sites shut down. It’s because of the revaluation of American dollar, devaluation of Myanmar currency and the skyrocketed price of construction materials.
In current, construction have stopped at least 60 percent of their work as the prices keep rising and some companies operating at a loss.
He also explained “The prices of construction materials are too high. Most projects stopped operating. About 60 percent are stopped. Since we already win tinder and have contracts, we keep operating to finish up the ongoing projects even while unprofitable. Many construction workers became unemployed.”
Moreover, construction materials’ prices have not going down as much as we expected. Some are still in high rate while the currency exchange rate dropped are the reasons of unable to resume the projects.
Another construction businessman said “Even while the projects are not profitable, we keep running small project. Because many construction workers’ lives depend on it.”
“We run projects just to provide jobs for our people not for our profit. If they can’t work here, they may faced difficulties for living. Thus, we tried not to stop the projects. We merely covered the running cost but at least our businesses are still alive and the workers have regular income. We didn’t expect for the profit, but it’s okay as long as we cover the running cost. Moreover, we don’t have any other things to do. We only run small projects since we cannot cover the cost of bigger projects in such higher rate.
In Mon State, there are tens of thousands of construction workers depend on the construction industry. Many become unemployed as some construction projects shut down.