The seeds of growth in the real estate and construction industry lie in promoting the green transition, increasing R&D activities and internationalization. The next phase of the KIRA growth program is about to begin, which creates the conditions for sustainable growth in the industry, better customer experience and improved productivity.
The built environment plays a really significant role in our everyday life: we spend 99 percent of our time in the built environment, 83 percent of our national wealth is tied up in buildings and infrastructure, 60 percent of all investments in Finland are related to the built environment, and one in five Finns is employed in the built environment.
The built environment is also a significant consumer of energy - about 35 percent of Finland's total energy consumption - and a producer of emissions, about 30 percent of all CO₂ emissions. It goes without saying that the built environment in the future will be subject to great development needs and pressures, in order to achieve, for example, Finland's goal of carbon neutrality in 2035.
The KIRA forum, i.e. the Real Estate and Construction Forum, has drawn up the KIRA growth program, which was published in February of this year, in cooperation with companies in the field, customers, the largest cities, ministries and research institutes. The goal has been to form a common desire for growth and to commit the KIRA sector to measures for innovative growth and to allocate long-term funding for goal-oriented development.
The growth opportunities of the KIRA sector have been examined in the program through three different themes. These are the green transition, productivity and digitalization, as well as value creation that permeates the entire life cycle. In total, hundreds of experts in the field have participated in the creation of the KIRA growth program, and the published growth program serves as a development road map for all players in the field. The KIRA forum has also published a value promise for the real estate and construction industry: a functional, safe and sustainable built environment in 2030. The measures of the KIRA growth program create the conditions for fulfilling this promise.
Separate thematic goals have been drawn up for the three themes of the KIRA growth program, which are aimed at with identified growth opportunities, i.e. measures. 13 of these growth opportunities have been identified. They create both a competitive advantage on an international level and solve key, known challenges in the industry, such as low customer satisfaction, quality, profitability and productivity development.
Of the identified growth opportunities, the greatest growth potential is seen in sustainable buildings and infrastructure, flexible solutions, low-carbon building materials, energy-efficient solutions and optimization of energy use, and circular economy. According to the research, companies in the field plan to invest in all of these in the future.
Development requires investments in R&D activities
The renewing growth of the KIRA industry requires companies to make more extensive development efforts and investments than normal operations. Investments include different types of measures, such as piloting, joint development and influencing market practices.
Investments in R&D activities create innovations that are needed to speed up the necessary renewal of the built environment to a low-carbon and energy-efficient one. The KIRA sector's goal is to reach the national four percent RDI target partly with the help of the growth program, even though the chronic lack of public RDI funding has become a bottleneck in the KIRA sector. In part, it is possible to use funding from the sustainable growth program (RRF). In addition to this, it is important that the goals are promoted by focusing attention on supporting RDI activities in the real estate and construction sector, for example through tax incentives and direct funding.
The procedural reviews highlight the need for investment projects that enable the implementation and piloting of innovations. Among the customer groups, cities and state customer organizations play a significant role as customers of large projects. The demands of customers and financiers also serve as both drivers and enablers for operations in accordance with sustainable development and life cycle thinking.
Emissions are not reduced by reducing construction, but by renewing the built environment and building with new and more efficient and sustainable methods than before. Users of the built environment and ultimately society as a whole benefit from innovations and services of greater added value.
Program Director to accelerate development
In the preparation of the growth program, it was recognized that the growth opportunities need activation, ideation, meeting and driving companies to take things into practical implementation. In order to speed up the growth progress of the KIRA sector, the need for a separate operational operator supporting the growth program and joint guidance of the sector has been identified. For this purpose, the KIRA forum, together with the Ministry of the Environment, has decided to resource this task by hiring a separate program director.
This next phase of the KIRA growth program will be promoted as a program director Mia Toivanen, who will start in the position at the beginning of 2023. In the next phase of the KIRA growth program, the aim is to identify and assemble company-led consortia and to create new ecosystems from which we want to grow new business both in Finland and on international markets. The purpose is to initially invest in a few growth opportunities that are notable in terms of effectiveness and ready for investment.
Mia Toivase has solid experience in developing different ecosystems and networks and working in cooperation with KIRA industry players. This know-how and the knowledge of the operators in the field are of significant benefit in promoting the KIRA growth program. The follow-up measures of the KIRA growth program will be carried out in strong cooperation with KIRA industry players. The work is also supported by KIRAHub, which has already played a significant role as an innovation ecosystem for operators in the built environment. The program director is supported by an operational steering group and the board of the KIRA forum.
The text has been published In RIL's Rakennustekniakki magazine 4/2022.
Antti Aaltonen
Director, Construction Development
antti.aaltonen@rt.fi + 358 40 514 3626Confederation of Finnish Construction Industries (CFCI)
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