Outlook fair for second century

BCSA President Donal McCormack

Martin Nielsen of Scott Wilson

Record output by the constructional steelwork industry over the coming few years was forecast by BCSA President Donal McCormack at the annual lunch. Output growth was continuing against a background of increasing market share in key sectors, said Mr McCormack.

Clients and designers still preferred steel as a framing material despite the price rises of the past couple of years that had been forced on steel producers by rising world prices for raw materials, energy and transport. Steel was still cost competitive against rival materials and the other advantages of using steel provided an attractive competitive advantage to those who selected it. Market share was at an all time high in the key multi storey non residential market.

Total output of 1.336M tonnes of structural steelwork was expected this year and another 2% growth was expected in each of the next two years. ‘Hosting the Olympic games should be of great benefit to our industry and further increase demand over the next five years,’ Mr McCormack predicted.

Guest speaker Martin Nielsen of Scott Wilson, Chairman of the Association for Consultancy and Engineering (ACE), said he was honoured to be addressing the Association during its Centenary year. For the BCSA to have flourished for 100 years was a truly significant achievement, he said. ‘We see evidence of your work, of construction and engineering excellence, every day,’ he said. ACE backed BCSA’s calls for action over the pace of implementation of Eurocodes