Industrial Production Dips 0.3% in Dec, Retail Inflation Up 0.24%

India’s industrial production shrinks 0.3 percent in December against 2.5 percent growth in same month year ago.

Image used for representational purpose.

(Photo: Reuters)

The country's industrial output contracted by 0.3 percent in December, weighed by a decline in the manufacturing sector, government data showed on Wednesday, 12 February.

Meanwhile, retail inflation also inched up to 7.59 percent in January 2020 on costlier food items, showed government data on Wednesday. The Consumer Price Index (CPI)-based retail inflation was 7.35 percent in December 2019 and 1.97 percent in January last year.

According to the National Statistical Office (NSO) data, manufacturing sector output declined by 1.2 percent compared to growth of 2.9 percent in the same month a year ago.

Electricity generation also dipped 0.1 percent as against a growth of 4.5 percent in December 2018.

The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) had grown by 2.5 percent in December 2018.

Mining sector output grew by 5.4 percent, compared to a contraction of 1 percent earlier.

The IIP growth during April-December period of the current fiscal decelerated to 0.5 percent from 4.7 percent expansion in the same period of 2018-19.

The food inflation last month was 13.63 percent, compared with (-)2.24 percent in January 2019. However, it is down from 14.19 percent in December.

The Reserve Bank of India had kept the key policy rate unchanged earlier this month mainly due to high inflation.

(With inputs from PTI)