Key infra growth rebounds to 6.8% in November

27 Dec 2011 Evaluate

Giving a big relief to the government and industry, industrial growth in key infrastructure areas bounced back to 6.8% in November after touching a five-year low of 0.3% in October. As per the data released, the turnaround in industrial production has been possible due the combined output rise of eight core industries - coal, crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilizers, steel, cement and electricity - which recorded the highest growth in 4-months, and also sharply higher than the annual growth of 3.7% in November last year.

On the other hand, due to lagging performance in the previous months, the April-November growth of core industries stood at 4.6% as against 5.6% in the same period last financial year, according to the data released. Except for crude oil, natural gas and fertilizers, all other segments registered a healthy growth in November. The maximum growth was witnessed in cement, which expanded by 16.6%, while there was a contraction of 4.3% in the same period last financial year.

The eight infrastructure sectors, account for nearly 38% of the IIP, the measure of industrial activity in India and hence are likely to improve the total industrial production. The biggest relief in core sector’s data was the 4.9% rise in coal production, the highest since March 2010 and the first expansion after three straight months of contraction. Electricity and steel output grew by 14.1% and 5.1% against 3.5% and 7.6%, respectively, in the same month last year. Petroleum refinery products growth also went up by 11.2% during the month under reference.

Power grew 14.1% from a year earlier, compared with 5.4% in the previous month. In the eight months to November, it added 9.3% compared with 4.6% in the previous year. However, crude oil and natural gas output posted a de-growth of 5.6% and 10.1% from a positive growth of 17% and 5.5%, y-o-y, respectively.

During October, the core sector, registered a dismal growth of 0.3%. This slowdown in the industry output was obvious from the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figures, which stood at 6.9% - the lowest in the past nine quarters, during the July-September quarter. The economic growth in the first half of the current fiscal also slowed down to 7.3% from 8.6% in the year ago period.

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