An aging population, personnel shortages and sustainability goals are forcing the construction industry to make fundamental choices. According to Jan van der Doelen, sector specialist Building & Construction at ING, the future belongs to industrialization and bio-based construction - provided the government gets firmly behind the wheel now.
In ten years, the number of people employed in construction has increased sharply to about 510,000 workers. For a long time, that growth compensated for the lack of productivity gains, says Jan van der Doelen of ING Sector Banking. "But that stretch is gone. In the coming years, personnel will become the big bottleneck. With a quarter of construction workers over the age of 55 and a declining influx from vocational schools, it will be difficult to maintain productivity."
The choice: craft or industry
This makes the need for innovation more urgent than ever. According to Van der Doelen, the construction industry faces a fundamental choice: continue on the traditional, artisanal path - or accelerate the shift to an industrial way of building. "Increasingly, you see that a hybrid form, combining craft and industrial construction, is difficult to sustain. The economies of scale needed to invest in advanced prefab solutions and robotization are then lacking," he warns.
Prefab and industrialized construction methods do offer perspective: they allow for faster and more efficient construction, with less reliance on manual labor. "Especially at a time of labor shortages and rising construction costs, that is an important key for the future."
Bio-based building: necessary but still immature
In addition to productivity, sustainability is playing an increasing role. Biobased construction with natural materials such as hemp, flax and straw offers opportunities to reduce CO₂ emissions in construction and improve the indoor climate, according to Van der Doelen. Yet large-scale application remains to be seen.
The recently released final report of research program STOER even sounds the alarm: the availability of traditional building materials is under pressure, while the biobased chain is still fledgling. "Farmers want to grow, but demand certainty about price and sales. Construction companies want to invest, but run into higher costs and inefficient processes," Van der Doelen said.
Government direction required
ING's sector specialist says active government direction is essential to scale up the bio-based construction chain. He advocates linking agricultural and construction policies, rewarding ecological performance and creating stable sales markets. Licensing of traditional raw materials such as sand and gravel should also be scrutinized.
As far as he is concerned, the direction is clear: "Circular construction is no longer a choice, but a necessity. If we want to achieve the goals of the National Approach to Biobased Building (NABB), the government must move forward now with concrete measures. Only then can we build faster, more affordable and more sustainable."
