The consortium consisting of Balfour Beatty, Carillion and Galliford Try (Morrison Construction) will now start detailed design work on the £745m Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route and Balmedie/Tipperty project.

The consortium beat rival bids for the 28-mile road job from the North East Roads Partnership and Granite City consortia.

Brown said: “The announcement today ensures we remain well on course, with the contract expected be awarded and construction starting in earnest before the year is out.”

The AWPR will consist of four sections; from Stonehaven to Cleanhill, Charleston to North Kingswells, North Kingswells to Blackdog, and Balmedie to Tipperty.

Construction will include 12 junctions, two river crossings at the River Dee and River Don, and an underbridge for crossing the Aberdeen to Inverness Railway.

The project also includes four major pipeline crossings and three wildlife bridges as well as more than 100 other structures.

It will be built using the non-profit distributing model of PFI used in Scotland.

Brown added: “Over the next three decades, our investment in the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route project is expected to bring in an additional £6bn to the local economy and create around 14,000 new jobs.

“During construction we would expect to see benefits similar in scale to the recently completed M74 scheme, which directly generated 900 construction jobs. It will also provide on-the-job training for apprentices and local employment opportunities.

He said:  “AWPR advance works are well underway with small and medium sized businesses from the north-east already benefiting.”