Construction and engineering group Murray & Roberts (MUR) is casting its eyes eastwards towards China.

"With China set to dominate trade and investment affecting our sector over the next decade at least, Murray & Roberts is actively seeking new opportunities to access the potential of this growing market," Murray & Roberts group chief executive Brian Bruce said.

He was commenting after the release of the group's interim results for the six months to the end of December which showed headline earnings per share unchanged at 71 cents and attributable earnings marginally down from from R230 million to R229 million.

Bruce said that adverse market conditions had slowed the pace of its Rebuilding Murray & Roberts strategy in the first half of the year and that the strong rand had been a major cause of a 20% reduction in revenues to

R4.2 billion from R5.2 billion in the previous comparative period.

Commenting on the results, Bruce said: "We have maintained focus on our performance commitment in what has become a challenging year for Murray & Roberts and our associated industries.

"The general level of construction activity in South Africa has remained buoyant but new investment in major projects has stalled under the local impact of a weakened US Dollar and domestic investment uncertainty.

"Manufacturing from South Africa has become relatively expensive for global markets, intensifying our internal focus on product and process improvement.

International engineering and construction markets still offer focused opportunity but local country conditions increasingly dominate project risks. We are cautious on the rest of Africa, positive on Australasia and have increased our market capability in the Middle East," he added.

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Publisher: Business Day
Source: Business Day