Manufacturing posts best rise for 12 years

Manufacturing is showing a strong recovery, according to the latest official figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

The output of the UK’s manufacturing sector rose by 2.5% in the three months to April compared with the previous three months. That is the highest increase since October 1998 when it rose by 2.6%.

There was a 7.9% rise in the engineering and allied industries, while output in basic metals and other products rose by 3.6%.

On the same three-month period a year earlier, manufacturing was 2.9% higher.

The more volatile monthly figures produced by the ONS showed that in April 2010 manufacturing output rose by 3.4% on a year earlier.

Output rose in 11 of the 13 manufacturing sub-sectors and fell in the other four. The largest increase in output —10.6% — was in the transport equipment industries and within this sub-sector there was a particularly strong performance in car manufacturing with a 28.6% rise.

Output of the production industries (manufacturing, mining and utilities) rose by 2.1% in the three months to April 2010 on the previous three-month period, and was 1.6% up on the same three-month period a year earlier.

On a monthly basis, production was up by 2.1% on a year earlier.

www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/iop0610.pdf