RosStat’s report on August base sectors and other fundamental indicators shows the continuation of the negative stagnation trend seen in H1. Capital investment continued to be negative: declining by 4% y/y in August alone and by 1.3% y/y in Jan-Aug overall (vs. EconMin’s expectations of 2.4% growth in 2013). Industrial output continued to fluctuate around 0% growth, inching up by 0.1% y/y in August.
Transportation in August ended two consecutive months of negative y//y growth posting 0.3% y/y increase in turnover. This is unlikely to result in higher industrial output in the early fall: railway transportation was still in decline of 2% y/y in August and 2.8% y/y in Jan-Aug overall. Slight growth of transportation in August is to be attributed to pipelines (up by 3.7% y/y in August, 1.3% y/y in Jan-Aug).
After jumping to 6% y/y growth due to favorable y/y base in July, in August construction declined by 3.1% y/y. Also retail trade, which throughout 2013 was the only resilient base sector slowed down: from 4.3% y/y in July to 4% y/y in August. Agriculture (which was previously cited by the authorities as one of the main factors that were supposed to support recovery in H2/13) also slowed down to 3.3% y/y growth.
Base Industries (%, y/y) |
2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | Dec-12 | Jan-13 | June | Aug | |
Industry | -9.3% | 8.2% | 4.7% | 2.6% | 1.4% | -0.8% | -0.7% | 0.1% | |
Construction | -13.2% | -0.6% | 5.1% | 2.4% | 1.6% | 1.4% | 6.1% | -3.1% | |
Agriculture | 1.2% | -21.9% | 23.0% | -4.7% | 1.4% | 2.5% | 5.8% | 3.3% | |
Transport | -10.1% | 6.9% | 3.4% | 1.7% | 0.9% | -0.7% | -1.1% | 0.3% | |
Retail | -5.5% | 6.3% | 7.2% | 5.9% | 5.0% | 4.2% | 4.3% | 4.0% | |
Source: RosStat |
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