(Finance) – Italian industrial production is doing better than forecasts more pessimistic formulated by Confindustria and analysts and signals a further trend growth in March and in the first quarter of the year, despite the outbreak of the war in Ukraine. This is what emerges from the data published this morning byIstat.
In March, the industrial production remained stable compared to February, against the -1.9% expected, closing the first quarter with a decrease of 0.9% compared to the previous three months. In detail, there was a sustained economic increase for energy (+ 2.7%) and more contained growth for consumer goods (+ 1%) and capital goods (+ 0.4%); vice versa, there was a decrease for intermediate goods (-0.7%).
In trend terms and net of calendar effects, production increases by 3% (the calendar working days were 23 as in March 2021), compared to the + 1.3% expected, bringing the balance for the quarter at + 1.3% compared to the same period of 2021. There were marked trend increases for consumer goods (+ 8.1%), energy (+ 5.2%) and to a lesser extent for capital goods (+ 3%); On the other hand, the sector of intermediate goods decreased (-0.4%).
THE sectors of economic activity that the wider trend increases are the industries textiles, clothing, leathers and accessories (+ 15%), the manufacture of computer and electronic products (+ 7.5%) and the manufacture of machinery and equipment nec (+ 7.4%). The greatest downward trends are recorded in mining activities (-9%), in the manufacture of means of transport (-3%) and in metallurgy and manufacture of metal products (-1.8%).