KAMPALA, Uganda–The Annual construction Sector Indices report from the Uganda Bureau of statistics indicates that costs for the construction sector in the country have increased by 0.1% for the year ending January 2018 compared to the year ended December 2017 whose rate was 1.2%.
Addressing the media in Kampala Dick Wanaso Wadada, Senior Statistician at UBOS attributed the costs increment on the increasing prices for the construction inputs especially for residential buildings and civil works across the Country. “We saw a price increment of 0.4% in prices of inputs for residential buildings and also an increase of 2.4% in prices of inputs for the civil works subsector across the country” Wanaso said.
According to the UBOS report , the country experienced increase in costs for inputs, the most affected ones being Cement.
UBOS Statistics indicate that prices for steel and other iron related materials increased by 8.3% due to high production costs , electrical wire and cables prices went up by 2.28% due to the increasing prices for copper , diesel and Bitumen, the prices rose up to 8.28% and 3.81% respectively.
“When you sum up all the increasing costs for the construction inputs this automatically had to push the costs in the construction sector country wide although the rate was at snail pace “ Wadada said.
On Monthly basis the UBOS report indicates that the cost for the construction sector increased by 0.13% this was also due to the increasing costs in the Whole construction sector which increased by 0.13% in the Month of January 2018 compared to December 2017.
The 0.13% was influenced by an Increase in inputs prices for the buildings of residential nature whose rate stood at 0.13 compared to nonresidential buildings whose cost rate increased by 0.10%.