page_title: Castilla–La Mancha
section_title: Industry and construction
hierarchical_section_title: Castilla–La Mancha / Economy / Industry and construction
context_page_description: Castilla–La Mancha, or Castile La Mancha, is an autonomous community of Spain. Comprising the provinces of Albacete, Ciudad Real, Cuenca, Guadalajara and Toledo, it was created in 1982. It is bordered by Castile and León, Madrid, Aragon, Valencia, Murcia, Andalusia, and Extremadura. It is one of the most sparsely populated of Spain's regions. Albacete is the largest and most populous city. The government headquarters are in Toledo and the High Court headquarters are in Albacete.
  Castilla–La Mancha was formerly grouped with the province of Madrid into New Castile, but with the advent of the modern Spanish system of autonomous communities, it was separated due to great demographic disparity between the capital and the remaining New-Castilian provinces. Also, distinct from the former New Castile, Castilla–La Mancha added the province of Albacete, which had been part of Murcia; adding Albacete placed all of the historic region of La Mancha within this single region.
  It is mostly in this region where the story of the famous Spanish novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes is situated, due to which La Mancha is internationally well-known.
context_section_description: Traditionally, Castilla–La Mancha has had little industrial production, due to several factors among which are low population density and a shortage of qualified workers. However, since Spain's incorporation into the EU, there has been much progress. Industry has been growing as a sector of the regional economy at a faster pace than nationally. July 2006 figures show the region as third among the autonomous communities in the rate of growth of the industrial sector. Regional industrial GDP grew 2.8 percent in 2000–2005, compared to 1 percent nationally for the same period.
  The greatest obstacles to industrial growth in the region have been:
  Lack of a dense business fabric.
  Undersized industrial enterprises.
  Little specialization of labor.
  Little investment in R & D.
  Poor infrastructure with respect to services to enterprises.
  Little export orientation.
  Inadequate marketing channels and distribution for regional products.
  The principal industrial areas within the region are Sonseca and its comarca, the Henares Corridor, Puertollano, Talavera de la Reina, La Sagra y Almansa, as well as all of the provincial capitals.
  As throughout Spain in recent decades, the construction sector is one of the strongest. It employs 15.6 percent of the work force and produces 10.1 percent of regional GDP. It is one of the fastest-growing sectors of the economy: growth in 2006 was 13.6 percent. Most of the construction sector, is housing, including a new city of 30,000 inhabitants, Ciudad Valdeluz in Yebes, Guadalajara; 13,000 dwellings in Seseña, Toledo and the Reino de Don Quijote complex in the province of Ciudad Real, with 9,000 dwellings and 4,000 hotel beds.
caption: Partial view of the petrochemical complex at Puertollano.
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