Industrial growth again turns negative in January

12 Mar 2009, 1220 hrs IST, PTI

NEW DELHI: Industrial production declined by 0.5 per cent in January 2009, the contraction being for the second month in a row, in spite of stimulus packages announced by the government to ward off the impact of global recession.

Industrial output grew by 6.2 per cent in the same month a year ago.

This is the third time in this fiscal that industrial growth has turned negative.

The slide in industrial production was led by manufacturing, which fell by 0.8 per cent, followed by mining output, which declined by 0.4 per cent.

However, electricity generation was up 1.8 per cent in January.

For the first 10 months of this fiscal, industrial growth stood at 3 per cent, which might make the official projection of overall economic growth of 7.1 per cent for 2008-09 quite difficult.

The official projection pegged industrial growth to be 4.8 per cent for 2008-09.