Factory output growth accelerates in January

VOLUME and value of factory output grew at a faster pace in January this year, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said.

Data released on Friday showed that the value of production index (VaPI) went up by 4 percent in January, up from the 0.4-percent expan-sion in December 2024.

The VaPI was also a turnaround from the -1.4 percent recorded in January last year.

"The acceleration in the annual rate of VaPI for manufacturing in January 2025 was mainly attributed to the annual increase in the manufac-ture of food products at 9.3 percent during the month from an annual increase of 1.4 percent in the previous month," said the PSA.

The slower annual decline recorded in the manufacture of basic metals and the faster annual increment of manufacture of machinery and equipment except electrical also contributed to the faster increase in VaPI in January.

The volume of production (VoPI), meanwhile, rose by 3.2 percent in January, higher than the 0.4-percent expansion in December last year.

In January last year, the VoPI recorded a decline of 0.3 percent.

The PSA attributed the increase to the faster growth in manufacture of food products, basic metals, and machinery and equipment.

Meanwhile, the average utilization rate for the manufacturing section in January slightly went up to 75.9 percent from 75.6 percent in Decem-ber.

In January 2024, the average capacity utilization rate was recorded at 74.5 percent.

"All industry divisions reported capacity utilization rates of more than 60.0 percent during the month," said the PSA.

The top three industry divisions in terms of reported capacity utilization rate were printing and reproduction of recorded media at 83.3 per-cent, manufacture of other nonmetallic mineral products at 82.0 percent, and other manufacturing, and repair and installation of machinery and equipment at 80.7 percent.