Canada’s lagging construction industry linked to housing affordability issues: StatCan

A new study from Statistics Canada linked a lagging construction industry and small businesses to housing affordability issues across the country. In a study released Wednesday, Statistics Canada (StatCan) found that construction companies have been decreasing in productivity nationwide, and “smaller firms accounted for the overall decline in labour productivity.”Increasing the efficiency of construction, “is the long term key to improving housing affordability,” said Aled ab Iorwerth, Canada Mortgage Housing Corporation (CMHC) deputy chief economist and a co-author of the report, in a Wednesday interview with CTVNews.ca. “It’s not going to be a quick process,” said ab Iorwerth. “It’s going to take years of consistent building of more housing. Now, it’s not just that we’re building more housing, but we need to get those housing built at a reasonable cost.”Al Iorwerth also said that companies need to “deploy the latest technologies … use materials in a better way,” and hire better skilled workers.“The scale of the challenge we’re facing is enormous, particularly in our large cities,” he added.‘Massive increase’ in housing starts needed “It is estimated that Canada requires a massive increase in housing starts to meet demand and improve affordability by 2035,” the study said, citing the CMHC. StatCan added that Canada’s construction industry has been lagging behind other sectors in productivity growth for 20 years. The study suggested that the slow growth in construction “ma...