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 In the first six months of this year, industrial production increased over the same period of last year in 14 different regions of Brazil, according to the Regional Industrial Survey, conducted by the Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics (IBGE).
The southernmost Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul grew the most, at 8.5%, followed by the states of Minas Gerais (Southeast), at 7.9%, Paraná (South), at 7%, and Pernambuco (Northeast), 6.4%.
In Rio Grande do Sul, the greatest contributions came from the sectors of oil refinement and alcohol production, machinery and equipment, and automotive vehicles. The state of Santa Catarina (South) recorded a 4.8% growth, Espírito Santo (Southeast), 4.3%, and São Paulo (Southeast), 4.1%.
Industrial production in the northern Brazilian state of Pará increased by 3.5% in the first six months of this year compared with the same period of 2006, production in Rio de Janeiro rose by 2.3%, northeastern production grew by 2.2%, the output in the state of Goiás (Midwest) rose by 1.6%, the state of Ceará (Northeast) recorded a 0.5% increment, the state of Bahia (NE) achieved a 0.3% growth rate, and the state of Amazonas (N), 0.2%.
"Evolution in June was especially favorable to the states that achieved large production volumes in segments that are important to the industry dynamics, such as machinery and equipment, both for investment and recovery of the agricultural sector, and automobile production, which may be verified mainly in the southern states, in São Paulo, and Minas Gerais (Southeast)," explained Isabella Nunes, Analysis and Statistics manager at the IBGE.
Isabella said that the industry is recovering since September last year, and has already been growing for nine consecutive quarters. In the first six months of 2007, the growth rate was 4.8%, compared with 2.7% during the same period of last year.
Nevertheless, according to her, this is still far from the result achieved in 2004, when industrial production growth reached 8.3% in the first half of the year.
"This recovery points to a very strong maintained performance of the capital goods sector, which reflects a recovery in the agricultural sector, and in segments related to industrial investment. Other factors include the dynamism of automobile and auto parts manufacturing, and the maintenance of export commodities, such as iron ore, steel industry products, and oil," said Isabella Nunes.
In the accumulated result for the year, the activities that stood out the most in the Brazilian industry were machinery and equipments (17.5%) and automotive vehicles (8.9%). The sector of electronic material and equipment recorded a 9.1% decrease in performance.
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