IBGE points to a 0.9% increase in industrial production in March in Brazil

In the last 12 months, the increase was 0.7% in March — lower than the result in February (1.0%). However, there was a decline of 2.8% compared to the same month in 2023. The manager of the IBGE Monthly Industrial Survey, André Macedo, says that there is a growth trend in the latest results.

“In the last eight pieces of information, we only had one negative result, which was in January this year, with a drop of 1.1%, and in the other months results were somewhat positive, some more significant, others not so much, but The fact is that we have seen some kind of improvement in this industrial production since mid-2023”, he assesses.

He states that the result surpassed the level before the pandemic, in February 2020, which indicates an improvement in the pace of the sector, but reinforces that, even with the greater frequency of positive results, the industrial sector still has an important space to be recovered because of the losses you have had recently.

For economist Fernando de Aquino, member of the Economic Policy Commission of the Federal Economic Council (Cofecon), the industrial sector in Brazil still continues in a slow growth process.

“What draws attention is the very high drop of 10.7% in the production of capital goods, which are the goods that will be used to expand the economy’s productive capacity, in the gross formation of fixed capital. So, if we are not increasing the economy’s productive capacity, this means that we are not growing our productive capacity, which supports GDP growth, at an acceptable pace”, he comments.

Activities

The survey shows that the result was driven up mainly by textile products (4.5%), printing and reproduction of recordings (8.2%) and food products (1.0%).

The latter presents a similar dynamic to the sector in general, as explained by the IBGE manager.

“It intensifies the growth observed in the previous month, increasing 1% this month. It is an industrial segment that has been showing positive results for some time now. For us to have as a reference, this industrial segment is 7.3% above the pre-pandemic level. Remembering that the total of the industrial sector is 0.4%”, analyzes Macedo.

Among the 20 activities that showed a decline in production, motor vehicles, trailers and bodies (-6.0%) and computer equipment, electronic and optical products (-13.3%) were the main ones. Chemical products (-2.0%), beverages (-3.3%), leather, travel articles and footwear (-6.0%), clothing and accessories (-4.0%) also showed declines. 5%).