The construction industry of Northland is facing crisis and that can be understood from the number of building consents that have been given till now. They are just 36 which is the lowest that have happened in the industry in the last 17 years.

What is worrying is that the situation is equally bad on the national as well as the local level, informed the Registered Master Builders Association. They said that the industry is officially into recession again and this time the matters are worse.

Experienced people said that looking at the current situation the things are going to get worse.

In October there were 36 new home consents that were given. Out of these 19 are for Whangarei, 9 for Far North and the rest are for Kaipara. If one looks at the figures for September then the number is just half of it and is way below the December 2005 figure when 161 consents were given.

Industry sources have said that many firms are struggling. They said that while some of the companies are holding up well the situation will not remain the same in the coming days.

There are projects that have not been started for the last 6 months.