Industrial production and sales up in Q1
(08.06.2022) At the start of the year, all signs were on the up for Swiss industry. Production in the first quarter of 2022 rose by 7.9% year-on-year, according to figures from the Federal Statistical Office (FSO).
The first three months of 2022 closed with an increase in production: 5.1% in January, 15.4% in February, and 4.2% in March. The textile and clothing, and pharmaceutical industries were particularly buoyant with 16.7% and 15.5% growth rates in the first quarter of 2022, respectively, compared with the same period in 2021.
However, declines were reported in other sectors, notably mining and quarrying (-7.7%) which recorded its sharpest drop since the first quarter of 2020 (-11.3%). In the energy sector, production retracted by 9.3% year-on-year. In 2021, a decrease of -0.2% had already been observed between the first quarter of 2020 and the first quarter of 2021, but to a lesser extent.
Construction, meanwhile, experienced a decline in production volume (-0.5%), bringing total growth in the secondary sector to 6.9%. This put the brakes on the sector's growth observed in the second, third and fourth quarters of 2021. The building sub-sector is leveling off at +0.2%, while the civil engineering sub-sector has fallen to -3.8%.
Sales figures for the first quarter of 2022 showed growth of 11.1% in industry and 3.3% in construction. Here too, the building sub-sector is in the lead with a +5.3% increase on the previous year, while civil engineering has seen a slight decline of 1.9% over the same period.