India’s core sector, comprising six key infrastructure industries, grew 9.4 per cent in January 2010, compared with 6 per cent in the previous month and 2.2 per cent in January 2009. The growth, signifying recovery in industrial manufacturing, was primarily led by an increase in the production of crude oil, electricity and finished steel last month.
The sector, which accounts for 26.7 per cent of the Index of Industrial Production (IIP), will help in clocking double digit industrial growth for second month in a row. “The data is on expected lines. We can definitely expect double-digit growth in IIP numbers for January. While the core data fluctuates a lot, it will surely push the industrial growth higher,” said DK Joshi, principal economist at research and ratings agency Crisil India. IIP grew 16.8 per cent last December when the core sector had shown a 6 per cent growth.
Cumulatively, the core sector grew 5.4 per cent in the April 2009-January 2010 period, against 3 per cent in the corresponding period of 2008-09, according to the data released by the commerce and industry ministry today.
Crude oil production grew 9.7 per cent in January compared to a drop of 8.1 per cent in the same month last fiscal. Electricity and finished steel grew 5.6 per cent and 16.2 per cent, respectively, in January 2010 compared with 1.8 per cent and 3.2 per cent, respectively, in January 2009.
Production of petroleum products registered a growth of 3.8 per cent in January as compared to a drop of 1.3 per cent in the same month last year. Output of coal and cement grew 6 per cent and 12.4 per cent, respectively, last month as compared to a growth of 6.7 per cent and 3.2 per cent in the corresponding month last year.
In the April-January period, the output of petroleum refinery products dropped 0.5 per cent while coal output grew 8.2 per cent. Crude oil production was recorded down 0.1 per cent. Production of electricity, cement and finished steel grew 6.1 per cent, 11.2 per cent and 4.9 per cent, respectively, in the 10 months ended January 2010.