Recession in Croatia ‘devoured’ more than a hundred architects in a year

The number of construction projects commissioned to architectural firms has decreased by between 30 and 50 percent since last year, according to rough estimates.

A whole decade of prosperity in construction that employed the architectural profession without any problems has now completely vanished, and in the meantime, the increased number of designers has faced fierce competition for the few remaining jobs in the market. It was logical that a strong wave of recession, which brought the construction sector to its knees a year or two ago, would significantly affect architects this year, especially larger firms that handled the biggest projects. This coincided with a period when more qualified young architects with freshly completed degrees emerged, a number that had been significantly lower in recent years.

– In Zagreb, where the concentration of large firms is the highest, the overall picture is even worse than in Rijeka. There are data from the Employment Service indicating that over 100 architects in Croatia have lost their jobs in the past year. In Rijeka, it has not yet reached such proportions, but the volume of work is certainly much smaller and more rational business practices are in place, says Nenad Kocijan, a representative of the Croatian Chamber of Architects and Engineers in Construction. To illustrate, Kocijan points out that just last year he was looking for younger associates for certain larger projects and had difficulty finding them, but now instead, his office calls two to three unemployed architects each month. In addition to the reduced volume of work, architects are also struggling with the collection of payments for already completed jobs, and the general illiquidity has simply halted already contracted projects.

– Things have radically changed compared to last year and so far there are no visible improvements. Previously, many investments were initiated at least in the first part that includes project development and preparation of documentation, but now everything is stalling even earlier. Our office’s volume of work has decreased by about 10 percent and we have about three to four fewer employees than before, although we always »hover« around a total of 20 employees. However, the situation is the same everywhere, and even worse in the world, where, for example, in the Netherlands, a large number of firms have literally halved, and they are facing significant problems especially in Spain and Portugal, says Saša Randić from the Randić&Turato studio.

The president of the Association of Architects Rijeka, Igor Rožić, noticed the first signs of a more serious crisis in architecture through the mass withdrawal of foreign investors from planned projects in Croatia. – Later, this same situation transferred to smaller projects. First, the smaller investors and builders who built largely based on bank loans ‘fell off’, which rationalized this sector to some extent. It is not logical for investors to appear only with an extract from the land registry who order projects and receive huge loans from banks without any significant guarantees, which was the practice here in the last decade. That no longer exists, and for that reason, it seems to me that the volume of work will not be there anymore, at least not for a long time, adds Rožić.

However, architects note that this is how it is in their profession, and despite the global economic recession, it is just like that – a period of prosperity occurs, followed by a crisis period, which many of them have learned to some extent. What is currently being done in terms of jobs boils down to smaller investments from individual investors who have their own capital and do not depend so much on loans, as well as various preparatory actions, such as obtaining necessary permits, waiting for the resolution of property-legal relations, and so on, which in Croatia can take up to several years. (www.novilist.hr)