“Labour-intensive” is a phrase in economics to describe an operation in which
proportionately more labour is used than other factors of production.1
Labour-intensive construction may be defined as the economically efficient
employment of as great a proportion of labour as is technically feasible, ideally
throughout the construction process including the production of materials, to produce
as high a standard of construction as demanded by the specification and allowed by
the funding available; labour intensive construction results in the generation of a
significant increase in employment opportunities per unit of expenditure by
comparison with conventional capital-intensive methods. There are several stages of
employment intensity depending on the type of project and the parameters used to
define economic efficiencies. The first stage of labour intensity is costcompetitiveness
with conventional capital-intensive methods.