Manufacturing output sinks 23.4% in June on an m-o-m basis

The transport engineering cluster tallied the only decline among output clusters as the marine and offshore engineering fell 17.0% in June.

The Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) reported on Monday that the transportation engineering cluster declined 3.6% in June 2010 on a year-on-year basis. However, within the cluster, the land transport segment expanded 41.3% with higher level of production of parts and accessories for vehicles. The aerospace segment also grew 5.8% as improved air traffic resulted in more repair and maintenance jobs from commercial airlinesm, a report from the EDB said.

EDB said the decline was caused by the low output of the marine & offshore engineering segment, which fell 17.0% with fewer ship conversion and repair jobs in the shipyards.

Output of the transport engineering cluster in aggregate narrowed to 11.9% within the first six months of 2010 compared to the same period in 2009, the report said.

But EDB said on a year-on-year basis, manufacturing output has increased by 26.1% in June 2010. Output grew 24.8%, excluding biomedical manufacturing.

On a three-month moving average basis, manufacturing output in June 2010 increased 44.5% compared to the same period last year. For the entire first half of 2010, manufacturing output expanded 41.6%.

Clusters whose growth soared this month on a year-on-year basis were the electronics cluster, which increased by 46.8%; the precision engineering cluster, which expanded by 32.5%; the biomedical manufacturing cluster, whose output grew by 29.8%; the general manufacturing cluster, which increased by 11.0%; and the chemicals cluster, whose output grew by 7.4%.