Brazil industry output down 0.6% in August, offsets July rise

Brazil’s industrial production fell 0.6 percent in August from the previous month, which canceled out the 0.6 percent advance recorded in July. The data were released today (Oct 5) by official statistics agency IBGE.

The industry also experienced declines of 0.1 percent in the quarterly moving average, 1.3 percent year to date, and 2.7 percent in 12 months. On the other hand, a 2.8 percent expansion was observed comparing August this year with the same month last year.

The drop from July to August was driven by eight of the 26 surveyed activities, especially oil products and biofuels (-4.2%), food products (-2.6%), extraction (-3.6%), and textile products (-4.6%).

“The result keeps the industrial sector still at 1.5 percent below the pre-pandemic levels—that is, February 2020—and 17.9 percent below the record level reached in May 2011,” researcher André Macedo said.

Conversely, 18 industrial activities increased and prevented a more negative result for the nation—among them machinery and equipment (12.4%) and motor vehicles (10.8%).

Two of the four major economic categories of the industry experienced a reduction: semi- and non-durable consumer goods (-1.4%) and intermediate goods, i. e. the industrialized supplies used in production (-1.4%).

The climbs were boosted by durable consumer goods (6.1%) and capital goods, i. e. machinery and equipment used in production (5.2%).