India’s industrial output growth beat estimates in January as manufacturing picked up pace.
The index of industrial production rose 7.5 percent in January over a year ago, according to data from the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation. A Bloomberg poll of economists had expected 6.4 percent. The growth in December stood at 7.1 percent.
“IIP still remains strong, and we are climbing,” Saugata Bhattacharya, chief economist at Axis Bank, had told BloombergQuint before the data was released. “For the next couple of months, you will see strong IIP growth.”
Sixteen of the 23 industry groups in the manufacturing sector showed growth. The use-based classification showed that production of primary goods rose 5.8 percent, while capital goods output increased 14.6 percent.
Highlights
- Manufacturing output rose 8.7 percent over the same month last year.
- Electricity generation rose 7.6 percent year-on-year.
- Mining output rose 0.1 percent over last year.
- Infrastructure and construction goods’ output grew 6.8 percent.