Nigeria’s Manufacturing Index Declines in October

·Naira appreciates on parallel market

Obinna Chima

The Manufacturing Purchasing Manager’s Index (PMI) stood at 44.1 index points in October 2016, compared with the 42.5 recorded the preceding month.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), which disclosed this in the PMI report for October posted on its website yesterday, said the current position of the PMI indicated a slowing decline in the manufacturing sector during the review period.

According to the report, 14 of the 16 sub-sectors surveyed recorded declines in the review month in the following order: electrical equipment; primary metal; fabricated metal products; petroleum & coal products; transportation equipment; computer & electronic products; printing & related support activities; nonmetallic mineral products; plastics & rubber products; furniture & related products; paper products; textile, apparel, leather & footwear; cement and chemical & pharmaceutical products. The remaining two sub-sectors grew in the order: appliances & components and food, beverage & tobacco products.

Also, it showed that at 42.3 index points, the production level index for manufacturing sector declined for the 10th consecutive month, but at a slower rate than the index recorded in September 2016. In the same vein, 13 manufacturing sub-sectors recorded declining production level during the review month in the following order: transportation equipment; petroleum & coal products; electrical equipment; primary metal; computer & electronic products; fabricated metal products; plastics & rubber products; furniture & related products; nonmetallic mineral products; printing & related support activities; paper products; textile, apparel, leather & footwear and chemical & pharmaceutical products.

The appliances & components and cement sub-sectors remained unchanged, while the food, beverage & tobacco products sub-sector grew in the review period.

Meanwhile, the naira appreciated to N465 to the dollar on the parallel market as was predicted last week. But on the interbank FX market, the spot rate of the naira closed at N304.75 to the dollar.