PROSPECTS AND CHALLENGES IN THE KOREAN CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY: AN ECONOMIC OVERVIEW

The Korean construction industry has long provided a stable and strong power to the growth of the country's economy since the 1970's. The Korean construction activity continues to prosper nowadays as it is expected to rebound by 2.5% between 2015 and 2019. The government also continues to have high economic interest in all industry sector projects related to property investments in residential, commercial and infrastructure projects. However, analysts consider that the Korean economy is increasingly being over dependent on its construction industry. Many residential properties were designed, and for the most part still are, for single or young families. This may result in an unwelcome oversupply in the future especially with the ageing population. South Korea, with already 13.80% of eldery citizens, is expecting an eldery population rise up to 24.50% in 2030. This means that soon there will be a great demand on architects with design skills for senior citizens. This paper calls for addressing this critical demographic problem via the process of architectural constructions. The paper also suggests to work on a wide range of new and creative architectural models and gives a few recommendation to face all the contemporary and near future problems.