Chinese industrial production grows 5.6 percent year-on-year in August
Beijing, Sep 15 (efe-epa).- China’s industrial production grew 5.6 percent year-on-year in August, the fifth consecutive month of growth and the highest figure since December, the National Statistics Office reported Tuesday.
The figure exceeded analysts’ forecasts, who predicted an increase of around 5.1 percent for August.
The indicator collapsed by 13.5 percent year-on-year in the first two months of 2020, while in March it showed negative 1.1 percent, in April a rise of 3.9 percent, in May an increase of 4.4 percent and in June and July a rise of 4.8 percent.
Among the three main categories in which the office divides the indicator, the growth of the manufacturing industry stands out, which grew by 6 percent year-on-year, the same figure as the previous month.
In addition, electricity production and providers, heating, gas and water increased by 5.8 percent year-on-year in July, and the mining industry by 1.6 present.
The institution also compares the data of 41 industrial subsectors, of which 29 experienced an increase in their activity in August when compared to the same month of 2019.
Among the products whose manufacturing advanced the most, are electrical machinery (15.1 percent), vehicles (14.8 percent) and computers and other communications and electronic equipment (8.7 percent).
The office also made other indicators public Tuesday, such as retail sales, important data to measure the demand of national consumers and one of the pillars of the change in the economic model (from manufacturing to ones based on consumption) advocated by Beijing.
This section registered the first year-on-year increase in 2020, with 0.5 percent (the statistics ranged between 7 and 8 percent in the last months of last year, until the coronavirus pandemic caused a 20.5 percent drop in the first two months of 2020).
On the other hand, investment in fixed assets accumulated a fall of 0.3 percent in the first eight months of the year, a significant decrease compared to the -1.6 percent registered between January and July, according to the office.
In addition, the urban unemployment rate, another indicator released Tuesday, fell slightly to 5.6 percent, with an average of 46.8 hours of work per week, according to the agency.
The office assured that the data shows that “production demand continues to grow” and that “economic operations have continued to recover steadily.” EFE-EPA
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