DOHA: Qatar’s Industrial Production index (IPI) grew by 3.3 percent or 108.5 points in May, compared to the previous month and 4.7 percent from a year ago, according to data released by Ministry of development Planning and statistics (MDPS).
The index details the growth of various industrial sectors in an economy such as “Mining”, “Manufacturing”, “Electricity production and “Water production and desalination”. It is a short-term quantitative index that measures the changes in the volume of productions of a selected basket of industrial products over a given period with respect to that in a chosen period called the base period. The Mining index showed an increase by 3.6 percent compared to the previous month, as a result of the increase in the quantities of crude oil and natural gas produced by 3.6 percent, and the decrease in “Other mining and quarrying” by 0.2 percent.
When compared to the corresponding month of the previous year (May 2017), the IPI of Mining increased by 6.3 percent.
The Manufacturing index showed an increase of 1.7 percent due to the increase in production of four groups: ‘Manufacture of chemicals and chemical products’ by 3.0 percent, ‘Manufacture of basic metals’ by 2.8 percent, ‘Manufacture of beverages’ by1.6 percent and ‘Manufacture of food products’ by 1.2 percent.
However a decrease was recorded in other four groups: Manufacture of Cement & other non-metallic mineral products’ by 5.5 percent, ‘Printing and reproduction of recorded media’ by 2.5 percent, ‘Manufacture of rubber and plastics products’ by 1.8 percent, and Manufacture of refined petroleum products by 0.8 percent.
The Electricity Index showed an increase of 22.6 percent in the production of ‘Electricity’ group between May 2018 and the previous month, and witnessed a 23.1 percent year-on-year decrease. The Water Index recorded a decrease of 1.2 percent on month-on-month and a 13.1 percent on year-on-year.
