The Department of Construction Economics and Management at UCT has partnered with Nedbank Corporate and Investment Banking (NCIB) to develop an interdisciplinary research platform.
The Department of Construction Economics and Management at UCT has partnered with Nedbank Corporate and Investment Banking (NCIB) to form the UCT-Nedbank Urban Real Estate Research Unit. The unit will develop an interdisciplinary research platform to identify issues and solutions to urban real estate investment, finance, economics and management problems in Africa.
The aim is to develop a research alliance between UCT, industry and communities to collaborate with public and private sector partners, thereby ensuring a community- and industry-aligned agenda. “This engaged research aims to ensure that the property sector plays its role in fostering the needs of investors and other stakeholders,” says the unit's director, associate professor Francois Viruly. “There is a growing understanding that the performance of the built environment is not merely the outcome of economic growth, but has a critical role to play in creating the physical and social environment from which economies are able to prosper.”
According to Viruly there are huge risks in letting the African real estate sector boom take place without accompanying research and understanding of the impacts of property development.
This article originally appeared in Neighbourhood, Sunday Times.
