Review of Exogenous Economic Indicators Influencing Construction Industry

Abstract

Research works into the effect of economic factors on the construction industry are enormous. But finding the core economic factors is limited in the Ghanaian construction industry. In an attempt to address this research gap, this study articulates the aim of identifying exogenous economic factors influencing the construction industry through a qualitative literature review. The study used secondary data collected from over 50 published journals, conference papers, and dissertations on exogenous factors. Fifty-nine exogenous factors were identified, and the most prevailing ones were GDP, exchange rate, inflation, interest rate, consumer price index, etc. It also revealed that black market is a factor affecting construction industry in Saudi Arabia. The study contributes to the literature by highlighting generic and specific exogenous factors that should be of concern to players in the construction industry including policy makers in their project planning. This will help to reduce the incidence of high failure rate of construction firms. Again, it establishes the need to further study the real impact of these exogenous factors as well as the strategies to mitigate the influence of exogenous factors on the construction industry as this study was limited to qualitative literature review.