Industrial production grew at nine-month high of 5 per cent in February on improved mining and manufacturing activity coupled with larger offtake of capital goods.
The factory output, as measured by the Index of Industrial Production (IIP), had declined by 2 per cent in February 2014.
In the April-February period of 2014-15, IIP grew 2.8 per cent as against contraction of 0.1 per cent in same period of previous fiscal, as per the data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) today.
Meanwhile, the IIP for January has been revised upwards to 2.77 per cent from the provisional estimate of 2.6 per cent released last month.
Manufacturing output, which constitutes over 75 per cent to the index, grew by 5.2 per cent in February 2015 compared to a contraction of 3.9 per cent in the same month a year ago.
For April-February period, the sector saw an output growth of 2.2 per cent, compared to a contraction of 0.7 per cent in the year-ago period.
The output in the mining sector grew by 2.5 per cent in February, compared to a growth of 2.3 per cent in same month last year. During April-February period, output has grown by 1.5 per cent compared to a contraction of 0.7 per cent year-on-year.
The production of capital goods, a barometer of demand, grew by 8.8 per cent in February as against a contraction of 17.6 per cent in same month of last year.
During the April-February period, capital goods output grew by 6 per cent as against a dip of 2.6 per cent.
Fifteen out of the 22 industry groups in the manufacturing sector have shown positive growth during the month of February year-on-year.
