National industry
Industry grows 0.7% in spite of losses caused by environmental disaster
April 02, 2019 09h00 AM | Last Updated: April 02, 2019 10h49 AM
The national output of industry increased 0.7% in February, over January, with increases recorded in 16 of the 26 economic activities surveyed by the Monthly Survey of Industry, released today by the IBGE. Despite the positive result, mining and quarrying industries faced the biggest decrease in the series initiated in 2002 (-14.8%), mainly in the production of iron ore, as a result of the dam collapse and the release of red iron ore waste in the Brumadinho area (MG).
Among the activities, the main positive influences came from the production of motor vehicles, trailers and bodies (6.7%), food products (3.2%) besides coke, petroleum products and biofuels (4.3%).
“The widespread increase of output in February is also related to the calendar-effect, because in 2019, the month had two more business days than in 2018, since the Carnival holiday was in March”, explains André Macedo, manager of the survey.
Against February 2018, the industrial increase for the month was 2.0%, after three months of negative rates in a row. In spite of the increase, the industry faced a decrease (0.2%) in the cumulative index in the year (January and February 2019).
Among the four major economic categories, the highlights were Capital Goods, which increased 4.6% against January and 7.0% against February 2018. With positive results in both comparisons, it is also worth mentioning: Durable Consumer Goods (3.7% and 12.2%) and Semi and Non-Durable Goods (0.7% and 3.2%). The only negative results came from Intermediate Goods (-0.8% and -0.4%), which encompasses the activity of mining and quarrying industry.
