Dr Shahzad Nasim, Group Executive Chairman of Meinhardt Group International shares on his views on the economic outlook for construction business and industry and how Meinhardt is responding to it. This article was published on The Business Times, 31st October 2016.

REAL estate and related businesses such as construction and professional consulting services (like ours) are unfortunately inevitable victims of the boom and bust cycles of the property market worldwide.

Building sustainable businesses that can ride these cycles – and thrive – would be key for all companies big or small. Singapore’s real estate market is currently going through one of its most corrective structural phases.

The weak global economy is not helping. Many expect the government to do something, but it is neither prudent nor realistic to bail out businesses in difficulty.

Governments can only provide the enabling environment and in Singapore, the government does so – admirably well and in fact more. This is not the worst economic downturn nor will it be the last. Our company recognised this in 1997 during the Asian financial crisis.

We have since been diversifying our business model both in terms of geography and services offered.

The company now has 45 offices worldwide, but we need to do more to prepare ourselves better for these downturns.