IPI advances five per cent in November

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s Industrial Production Index (IPI) rose by 5.0 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) to 134.8 in November 2017, supported by positive growth in the output of the three main sectors of manufacturing, mining and electricity.

The manufacturing index jumped 6.7 per cent during the month, while mining went up 0.2 per cent and electricity by 3.9 per cent, the Department of Statistics Malaysia said in a statement yesterday.

It said the index for October 2017 remained unchanged at 3.4 per cent year-on-year.

The department highlighted that on a y-o-y basis, the manufacturing major sub- sectors which recorded an expansion in November 2017 were petroleum, chemicals, rubber and plastic products (7.5 per cent), electrical and electronic products (6.9 per cent) and food, beverages and tobacco products (8.2 per cent).

On a month-on-month basis, the IPI in November 2017 posted an increase of 1.9 per cent monthon-month due to an increase in the manufacturing index by 2.8 per cent and electricity index by 0.8 per cent, while the mining index remained unchanged.

On a cumulative basis, the IPI expanded 4.7 per cent from January to November 2017 compared with the previous corresponding period. The increase was also due to the rise in all indices, namely manufacturing (6.2 per cent), mining (0.9 per cent) and electricity (2.5 per cent).

Meanwhile on separate note, the department said Malaysia’s November manufacturing sales continued to record a strong growth of 10.9 per cent, rising to RM66.6 billion as compared to RM60.1 billion reported a year ago.

Y-o-y, the significant increase in sales value in November 2017 was due to the increase in electrical and electronic products (8.8 per cent), petroleum, chemical, rubber and plastic products (17.8 per cent) and non-metallic mineral products, basic metal and fabricated metal products (4.8 per cent).

These three sub-sectors contributed 79.7 per cent to the sales value of the manufacturing sector.

Total employees engaged in the manufacturing sector in November 2017 was 1,054,705 persons, an increase of 2.3 per cent or 23,960 persons as compared to 1,030,745 persons in November 2016.

Salaries and wages paid rose 9.2 per cent (RM297.2 million) to record RM3,530.0 million, thus registering average salaries and wages per employee of RM3,347 in November 2017.

Sales value per employee gained 8.4 per cent to record RM63,186 as compared with the same month of the previous year. — Bernama