/ 17 February 2000

‘BUILDING SECTOR TO GROW 4%’

FINANCIAL troubles at builder Stocks & Stocks Ltd did not betray a wider malaise in the local sector, which is expected to grow by four percent in 2000. “The situation at Stocks has no real influence on what’s going to happen in the industry,” said Building Industries Federation of South Africa (Bifsa) director Ian Robinson. Stocks, one of the country’s oldest builders, on Monday reported a sharp rise in interim losses to 115 cents per share from eights cents loss in 1998. It said shareholder funds had been wiped out and it would delist following an asset sale. But Robinson said the building industry, which shrank five percent in 1999 because of decade-high local interest rates, would show signs of recovery in the second half of 2000. “We are predicting that we will see a four percent growth rate in 2000, moving to five percent next year,” he said.