Industrial Production Growth Rises Marginally To 5.6% In February

India's industrial production growth rose marginally to 5.6 per cent in February from 5.5 per cent in January 2023, mainly due to good performance of the power, mining and manufacturing sectors, according to official data released on Wednesday. There was an improvement on an annual as well as sequential basis. The factory output growth measured in terms of the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) stood at 1.2 per cent in February 2022.

As per the IIP data released by the National Statistical Office (NSO), the manufacturing sector's output grew 5.3 per cent in February 2023 from 0.2 per cent a year ago. Mining output growth remained flat at 4.6 per cent during the month under review compared to the year-ago period. Power generation surged 8.2 per cent in February 2023 against 4.5 per cent.

As per use-based classification, the capital goods segment recorded a growth of 10.5 per cent in February against a growth of 1.3 per cent a year ago. Consumer durables output during the month declined by four per cent against a contraction of 9.7 per cent a year ago. Consumer non-durable goods output expanded by 12.1 per cent against a decline of 6.8 per cent earlier.

Infrastructure/construction goods posted a growth of 7.9 per cent compared to an 8.6 per cent expansion in the same period a year ago. The data also showed that the output of primary goods logged 6.8 per cent growth in the month against 4.6 per cent in the year-ago period.

The intermediate goods output in February contracted by 0.3 per cent compared to a growth of 4.1 per cent during the corresponding month last year. For the first 11 months of fiscal 2022-23 (April-February), the growth in IIP works out to be 5.5 per cent, down from 12.5 per cent in the year-ago period.