Industrial production grew at a nine-month high of 4.3% in August, mainly on account of robust performance of mining and power sectors coupled with higher capital goods output, official data showed on October 12.
Factory output growth measured in terms of Index of Industrial Production (IIP) stood at 4% in August 2016, as per data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO). The previous high in IIP growth was recorded at 5.7% in November 2016.
IIP growth during April-August period of this fiscal stood at 2.2%, down from 5.9% in same period in 2016-17. Meanwhile, the July IIP number was revised to 0.94% from 1.2% provisional estimates released in September.
The output growth in manufacturing sector, which constitutes 77.63% of the index, however decelerated to 3.1% in August from 5.5% a year ago. The output of the mining and electricity sectors grew at 9.4% and 8.3% as compared to August 2016.
As per use-based classification, the growth rates in August 2017 over August 2016 are 7.1% in primary goods, 5.4% in capital goods, (—) 0.2% in intermediate goods and 2.5% in infrastructure/ construction goods.
The consumer durables and consumer non-durables sectors recorded growth of 1.6% and 6.9%, respectively.
In terms of industries, 10 out of 23 industry groups in the manufacturing sector have shown positive growth during August 2017.
The industry group ‘Manufacture of computer, electronic and optical products’ showed the highest positive growth of 24.9%, followed by 16.5% in ‘pharmaceuticals, medicinal chemical and botanical products’ and 11.1% in ‘other transport equipment’.
On the other hand, the industry group ‘Manufacture of furniture’ showed the highest negative growth of (—) 16%, followed by (—) 15.1% in ‘tobacco products’ and (—) 11.4% in ‘Printing and reproduction of recorded media’.
