Activity in New Zealand’s manufacturing sector during October remained within a fairly tight band of expansion over recent months, according to the BNZ – BusinessNZ Performance of Manufacturing Index (PMI).
The seasonally adjusted PMI for October was 57.2 (a PMI reading above 50.0 indicates that manufacturing is generally expanding; below 50.0 that it is declining). While this was again 0.4 points lower than the previous month, the figure still represented very healthy and consistent levels of expansion. Overall, the sector has remained in expansion in all months since October 2012.
BusinessNZ’s executive director for manufacturing Catherine Beard said that the fundamentals of the October result remained healthy.
“The two main sub index values of production (60.7) and new orders (60.1) indicated strong expansion for October. Also, while the proportion of positive comments dipped in October (64.2%) compared with 69.5% in September, it was still similar to the 65% recorded in August.
BNZ Senior Economist, Craig Ebert, said that “October’s result was certainly encouraging, as was September’s – bearing in mind the PMI is about the nuts and bolts of activity rather than sentiment about where things might be heading”.
