New Zealand’s manufacturing sector saw a lower level of expansion for November, according to the latest BNZ – BusinessNZ Performance of Manufacturing Index (PMI).
The seasonally adjusted PMI for November was 50.6 (a PMI reading above 50.0 indicates that manufacturing is generally expanding; below 50.0 that it is declining). This was 3.6 points lower than October.
BusinessNZ’s Director, Advocacy Catherine Beard said that the up and down nature of the key sub-indices that make up the overall result shows that the sector has some way to go to get back to what we saw during the first half of 2021.
“New Orders (54.7) has remained very consistent over the last three months. Production (52.2), while positive, has remained somewhat lacklustre. Employment (48.2) fell back into contraction for the first time since December 2020, while Finished Stocks (48.3) and Deliveries (42.9) both returned in contraction after exhibiting expansion in October.”
“In addition, the proportion of negative comments from respondents rose to 57.6% in November, compared with 55.4% for October and 71% in September.”
BNZ Senior Economist, Doug Steel stated that “the PMI implications for economic (and employment) growth seem clear – soft. But with obvious difficulties remaining on the supply side, we’d suggest that inflation is still rising.”
