In September, volume of services rendered in the country changed by -0.3% from the previous month. For the second consecutive month, the sector registered a decrease of 1.6%, making up for part of the gain of 2.2% of the cumulative result of May-July. These are data from the Monthly Survey of Services (PMS), released today (14) by the IBGE.

The services sector is now 10.8% above the pre-pandemic level (February 2020) and 2.6% below the figure in December 2022 (peak of the time series). As for the cumulative index in the year, volume of sales increased by 3.4% against the same period in 2022. The cumulative index in 12 months reached 4.4%.

“September was the third month with the lowest revenue from service rendering in the year, ahead of January and April,” the survey analyst, Rodrigo Lobo, explains. Three of the five PMS activities recorded decreases, the main highlight being profissional, administrative and complementary services, which dropped by 1.1% due to the lower revenue from the following activities: legal, cleaning and engineering services. "There was only a natural movement of the group of companies forming these segments; we did not identify any special component that may have led to drops of the sector," the analyst says. With this result, the activity eliminates the 0.8% increase observed in August.

Another significant drop was that of information and communication, with a drop of 0.7% and recorded the third decrease in a row, with a cumulative loss of 1.7% in the period July-September, mainly due to the sector of technical support, maintenance and other IT services. As for transportation (-0.2%), the slight decrease was driven by the sectors of transportation, road transportation of cargo, the main segment in this group and one of the main weights in the survey, followed by air transportation of passengers. “In this activity, the result was influenced by the rise of air fares observed in September (13.47%), which ended up having a negative effect on the real revenue of air companies,” Mr. Lobo says.

Positive contribution from a major music festival

Considering the sectors with increase in the month, there was a highlight for services rendered to families, which advanced by 3.0%, having recovered part of the decrease of August (-3.7%). In this sector, the main influence came from “Other services rendered to families”, which was directly affected by the activity of musical shows. There was a big music festival in São Paulo, in September, and that had an effect on the sector as a whole.”

The sector of Other services grew by 0.8%, after three consecutive negative results, with a cumulative decrease of 3.3%.

Services fell in 20 of the 27 Federation Units in September

Most of (17) the 27 Federation Units recorded a drop in volume of services in September 2023 from August. The main negative impact came from São Paulo (-1.2%), followed by Goiás (-4.5%), Rio Grande do Sul (-1.6%) and Federal District (-2.6%). On the other hand, Rio de Janeiro (1.9%), followed by Ceará (1.9%) and Pernambuco (1.0%) recorded the main increases.

In the interannual comparison, volume of services recorded a drop after two and a half years

PMS also showed that, in the comparison against September 2022, the sector of services decreased by 1.2%, and interrupted a long sequence of positive rates for two years in this comparison. According to Rodrigo Lobo, this decrease was relatively disseminated in the sector analysis, but, only 10 of the 27 Federation Units followed the decrease in the country as a whole. Whereas in the first segment, the drop was driven by the sectors of transportation and other services, by area, São Paulo led the losses in the services sector. "The lowest revenues, from management of ports, road collective transportation of passenger and auxiliary financial services, investigated in the two sectors mentioned, coincide with the negative pressures of São Paulo, which ended up playing a relevant role for the drop of the national index," the analyst explains.

Therefore, the main decline was registered by São Paulo (-7.3%). On the other hand, Rio de Janeiro (5.5%), Paraná (11.1%) and Mato Grosso (20.8%), followed by Minas Gerais (4.3%), Mato Grosso do Sul (12.4%) and Ceará (5,3%) recorded the main advances.

As for the cumulative index in the year, 25 of the 27 Federation Units recorded increases

As for the cumulative index up to September 2023, the advance of volume of services in Brazil (6.3%) was registered in 25 of the 27 Federation Units. The main positive impacrs in regional terms occurred in Minas Gerais (8.4%), Paraná (11.9%) and Rio de Janeiro (5.2%), followed by Santa Catarina (9.2%) and Rio Grande do Sul (6.0%). The only negative contributions came from São Paulo (-0.9%) and Amapá (-3.8%).

Tourism activities record increases; transportation of passengers drop in September

The index of tourism activities increased by 1.5% from August to September, after a drop of 1.4% in the previous month. Therefore, the segment is 6.1% above the February level and 1.4% below the peak of the series, of February 2014..

Only five of the 12 areas surveyed recorded increases, with the most relevant contribution recorded in Rio de Janeiro (9,7%), followed by Minas Gerais (2.1%) and Santa Catarina (6.2%). On the contrary, Ceará (-1.7%), Rio Grande do Sul (-0.6%) and the Federal District (-0.7%) recorded the main decreases in regional terms.

Volume of transportation of passengers dropped by 1.1% from the immediately previous month, and made up for the increase of 0.7% registered in August. The segment is 0.9% below the level of February 2020, prior to the pandemic, and 23.7% below that of February 2014 (peak of the time series).

In turn, volume of cargo transportation also changed negatively, with a drop of 0.2% in September 2023, after a decrease of 1.8% in August. Therefore, this segment stood 1.8% below its peak in the time series (July 2023). Against the pre-pandemic level, cargo transportation is 43.5% above that of February 2020.

More about the survey

PMS produces indicators to monitor the short-term behavior of the services sector in Brazil. The survey investigates the gross revenue from services in formal enterprises that employ 20 or more persons, in which the main activity is a non-financial service, excluding the areas of health and education. It produces results for Brazil and all the Federation Units. Results are available at Sidra.

This is the ninth release of the new time series of the survey, which updated the sample of enterprises, as well as included methodological changes to portray economic changes in the society. They are updates already scheduled and periodically implemented by the IBGE. The next release of the Monthly Survey of Services will be on December 13.

Keywords: Setor de serviços varia -0, 3% em setembro