It Takes Twice As Long As it Should to Build New Factories in Israel – Report Says

Jerusalem, 27 November, 2025 (TPS-IL) — An in-depth study by the Ministry of Economy and Industry, conducted in collaboration with the Planning Administration, presented a comprehensive and sharp picture of one of the main barriers to establishing and expanding factories in Israel: long licensing procedures, repeated iterations, and multiple approving agencies that create a significant bottleneck for Israeli industry.

As a result, it takes about a year and a half to issue a building permit for a factory in Israel – more than twice as long as required by law.

From the report data:
30% of applications have been in process for over two years and 11% for over three years.
It takes an average of 2.7 iterations to approve a request and only 25% are approved in the first iteration.
Each application involves many approving bodies, sometimes up to 40.
Design control is the longest phase – 210 days on average.
No significant difference was found between the time it takes to issue a permit for a new plant and the expansion of an existing plant, a surprising statistic that illustrates that the barrier is systemic.