While the national industrial output retreated 0.8% in the seasonally-adjusted series, six out of the 14 places surveyed registered negative rates in August. The most intense declines were recorded in São Paulo (-1.4%) and Rio Grande do Sul (-1.4%). Negative rates lower than the national average (-0.8%) were reported in Minas Gerais (-0.7%), Pará (-0.7%), Paraná (-0.4%) and Ceará (-0.1%), whereas Santa Catarina (0.0%) posted a null change. The highest rises were registered in Espírito Santo (7.5%) and Bahia (4.9%), followed by Amazonas (3.2%), Rio de Janeiro (2.4%), Pernambuco (1.8%), the Northeast Region (0.4%) and Goiás (0.1%). The complete publication of the survey can be accessed here. 

Still in the seasonally-adjusted series, the evolution of the quarterly moving average index for the whole industry registered a null change (0.0%) in the quarter ended in August 2017 against the previous month level, after recording a cumulative expansion of 1.8% in three consecutive months of positive rates. Still in relation to the marginal movement of this index, nine places posted positive rates, highlighted by the sharper advances reported in Pernambuco (1.1%), Paraná (0.7%), Bahia (0.6%) and São Paulo (0.5%). On the other hand, Rio Grande do Sul (-1.5%) and Espírito Santo (-1.1%) registered the biggest losses in August 2017.

In the comparison with the same month in the previous year, the industrial sector grew 4.0% in August 2017, showing positive figures in 13 out of the 15 places surveyed. Mato Grosso (15.8%) recorded the most intense expansion, mainly leveraged by the advance in the sector of food products (frozen, fresh and cooled beef, cakes, bagasses, bran and other residues from soybean oil extraction and crude soybean oil). Pará (9.3%), Paraná (8.8%), Espírito Santo (7.8%), São Paulo (6.6%), Amazonas (5.3%), Santa Catarina (5.0%), Ceará (4.6%) and Bahia (4.6%) also posted positive rates steeper than the national average (4.0%), whereas Goiás (2.3%), the Northeast Region (1.7%), Minas Gerais (1.5%) and Pernambuco (0.3%) were the other places that registered a rising output this month.

Conversely, Rio Grande do Sul (-2.0%) and Rio de Janeiro (-1.8%) retreated in August 2017, mostly pressed by the negative behavior coming from the sectors of coke, petroleum products and biofuels, pulp, paper and paper products, food products and machinery and equipment in the former place; and of coke, petroleum products and biofuels and mining and quarrying industries in the latter.

The increase in the overall industry (1.5%) in the cumulative indicator in the year against the same period in 2016 reached 13 out of the 15 places surveyed, highlighted by the sharper advances recorded in Pará (8.6%), Paraná (4.6%), Espírito Santo (3.7%) and Santa Catarina (3.7%). Minas Gerais (2.0%), Amazonas (1.9%), Rio de Janeiro (1.8%), São Paulo (1.5%), Goiás (1.5%), Ceará (1.4%), Mato Grosso (1.2%), Rio Grande do Sul (1.1%) and Pernambuco (0.3%) were the other places that reported positive figures in the end of the first eight months of the year.

In these places, the greater dynamism was particularly influenced by the expansion in the manufacture of capital goods (especially those related to the agricultural, transportation and construction sectors); of intermediate goods (iron ore, petroleum, pulp, steel industry, sugar and soybean extraction derivatives); of durable consumer goods (cars and brown goods); and semi- and non-durable consumer goods (footwear, textiles and wearing apparel).

On the other hand, Bahia (-3.9%) registered the biggest decline in the cumulative index in the year, mainly pressed by the negative behavior coming from the sectors of basic metals (copper and copper alloy bars, profiles and rebars) and of coke, petroleum products and biofuels (diesel fuel, naphtha for petrochemicals and fuel oil). Having dropped 1.0%, the Northeast Region also recorded a negative rate in the cumulative indicator between January and August 2017.

Having dropped 0.1% for the whole industry in August 2017, the cumulative indicator in the last 12 months remained reducing the pace of decline initiated in June 2016 (-9.7%). Eight out of the 15 places surveyed posted negative rates in August 2017, though 13 of them were more dynamic compared with last July.

The major gains of pace between July and August 2017 were registered in Espírito Santo (from -4.5% to -1.4%), Mato Grosso (from -5.6% to -3.0%), Bahia (from -6.4% to -5.1%), Amazonas (from -1.4% to -0.2%), Paraná (from 1.9% to 2.9%), São Paulo (from -0.5% to 0.4%), Minas Gerais (from -0.4% to 0.2%) and Ceará (from -1.1% to -0.4%), while Pará (from 8.3% to 7.8%) and Rio Grande do Sul (from 0.6% to 0.4%) recorded the losses between the two periods.