Ammon News - The total area of buildings licensed in January 2023 jumped by 72.4 percent to 786,000 square meters (sqm) against 456,000 sqm in the same month of 2022, according to official figures.

The Department of Statistics (DoS) said Wednesday that the number of new building licenses issued in January increased by 45.3 percent to a total of 2,126 licenses, compared with 1,463 permits in January 2022.

Similarly, the area of buildings licensed for residential purposes rose by 86.7 percent, to 704,000 sqm, against 377,000 sqm during the same period last year, the figures showed.

As for buildings licensed for non-residential purposes, their area edged up by 3.8 percent, topping 82,000 sqm against 79,000 sqm for the same period last year, according to data.

Buildings licensed for residential purposes accounted for 89.6 percent of the total area of certified buildings, leaving 10.4 percent for buildings used for non-residential purposes, according to the DoS.

In its geographic breakdown of the data, the department said that the Kingdom's central region accounted for 63 percent of the total area of licensed buildings, followed by the northern and southern regions at 29.6 and 7.4 percent, respectively.