Manufacturing output still weak


The latest data shows factory output contracted in the three months to August.


Manufacturing output was down by 0.4% on the previous three months.


Factory output was 0.6% higher than the same period a year ago. Meanwhile, the volatile monthly figure showed a 0.2% increase in August compared with July.


In the three-month period ending August, output of the production industries — manufacturing, utilities and mining — was just 0.2% higher than the three months ending May, but 1.4% higher than the same period a year earlier.


The volatile monthly figure for production output showed a 0.4% contraction in August compared with the previous month.


In the three months to August 2016, production and manufacturing were 7.7% and 5.7% respectively below their level reached in the pre-downturn gross domestic product (GDP) peak in the first quarter of 2008, the Office for National Statistics said.


GDP

The production industries account for around 14% to 15% of the UK economy as measured by GDP. The latest estimate for GDP in the second quarter of 2016 is a 0.7% increase on the first quarter, a revision upwards of 0.1 percentage points from the second estimate. 


Production output increased by 2.1% in the second quarter compared with the first, unrevised from the previously published estimate, while manufacturing rose by 1.6%.


www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/bulletins/indexofproduction/aug2016


www.ons.gov.uk/economy/grossdomesticproductgdp/bulletins/quarterlynationalaccounts/quarter2aprtojune2016