Peak construction growth over

Growth in filled jobs in the construction industry has eased for the second consecutive year following a sustained period of higher growth, Statistics New Zealand said today.

After increases between 7.6 to 12.6 percent in filled jobs during the 2002 to 2005 December years, filled job growth in the construction industry slowed to 6.8 percent in 2006, and 5.1 percent in 2007. Even so, construction had the second highest growth of all industries for the year after mining.

Manufacturing was the only industry to have a decline in filled jobs for two years in a row, with decreases of 2.4 and 1.2 percent in the December 2006 and 2007 years respectively. Despite this decline, manufacturing remained the largest industry in the December 2007 year.

Overall filled job growth slowed from the 3.4 to 4.1 percent increases during the 2002 to 2005 December years, to 1.7 and 1.8 percent in the December 2006 and 2007 years respectively.

Average mean quarterly earnings for all jobs reached $11,170 in the December 2007 year, up 4.8 percent on the December 2006 year. Although the construction industry had slower growth in filled jobs, it was one of the key industry drivers in this increase.

These statistics are from the Linked Employer-Employee Data (LEED), and these, plus more detailed statistics, are available on the Statistics NZ website (www.stats.govt.nz/leed/).