Produção industrial
Alcohol production helps growth in April
June 05, 2018 09h00 AM | Last Updated: June 05, 2018 12h51 PM
After two months of stability, the national industry increased 0.8% in April over March, registering the highest expansion since December 2017, when it recorded 2.9%. The result was mainly influenced by the sector of coke, petroleum products and biofuels, which rose 5.2% against the previous month.
"The advance in this sector is mainly due to the bigger production of alcohol (biofuel) in April, as a result of the harvest of sugarcane started in mid-March. So much that we also perceived a growth in the food sector, leveraged by sugar", explains André Macedo, manager of the survey.
Still comparing with March, the following sectors also contributed positively: cars (4.7%), food products (1.4%), other transportation equipment (14%) and pharmaceuticals (4.5%). However, the most influential retreats were reported in: toiletries, machinery and equipment, and computer, electronic and optical equipment, which dropped 7.3%, 3.1% and 4%, respectively.
Compared with April 2017, the industry advanced 8.9%, mainly due to the growth of 40.6% in the car sector and of 32.8% in computer, electronic and optical equipment. In this comparison, only tobacco and printing and reproduction of recorded media declined, recording -5.6% and -1.3%, respectively.
Considering this result, the industry posted a cumulative growth of 4.5% in 2018 and of 3.9% in the last 12 months. "An improvement in the behavior of industry in April over the first quarter of 2018 can be perceived, though still insufficient to recover the loss of 2.1% registered in January", considers André Macedo.
