Industrial production fell 0.2% in February

From January to February, the production of domestic industry recorded a negative change of 0.2%, accumulating a decrease of 0.6% for three consecutive months. The production of the national industry is still 2.6% below the pre-pandemic level of covid-19, which considers February 2020 as a milestone. The result was also 19% below the series record, reached in May 2011 .

The Monthly Industrial Survey (PIM) was released this Wednesday (19) by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE). In the annual comparison, the fall was 2.4%. In the accumulated result for the year, the retraction is at 1.1%, and in the last 12 months, the indicator registers a decrease of 0.2%.

Activities

According to the IBGE, nine of the 25 activities surveyed by the PIM fell in February, with a drop of 1.1% in food products, 1.8% in chemicals and a reduction of 4.5% in pharmochemicals and pharmaceuticals.

The research highlights the drop in the production of beef, poultry and pork, juices and soy derivatives, influenced by the suspension of meat exports to China, due to mad cow disease at the end of February.

Other important reductions occurred in the activities of electrical machines, equipment and material (3.5%) and metal products (1.4%).

Among the 16 activities that rose in the period, the IBGE highlights extractive industries, which grew 4.6% after the 3.4% expansion recorded in January. Other important increases came from the sectors of beverages (3.6%); coke, petroleum products and biofuels (0.5%); printing and reproduction of recordings (11.2%); miscellaneous products (4%); metallurgy (0.8%); and computer equipment, electronic and optical products (2%).

Among the major economic categories, the main influence for the fall came from durable consumer goods, with a fall of 1.4%, intensifying the fall of 1.2% registered in January. Semi-durable and non-durable consumer goods fell by 0.1%, after four months of growth. The sectors of capital goods (0.1%) and intermediate goods (0.5%) presented growth.

In the annual comparison, the PIM reveals that the industrial sector fell by 2.4%, with a retraction spread across 17 of the 25 branches analyzed. In this analysis, the main negative influences were chemical products (8%); food products (3.8%); automotive vehicles, trailers and bodies (6.1%); and machinery and equipment (9%).

Increases were registered in eight activities, with emphasis on mining and quarrying (5.1%), boosted by items iron ores and crude oil.