SA factory output grows at slowest pace in six months

South African manufacturing output increased at the slowest pace in six months in September.

Production expanded 0.1 percent from a year earlier, Pretoria-based Statistics South Africa said in a statement Thursday. That’s less than the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey for a 1.9 percent increase.

Key insights

Africa’s most-industrialised economy hasn’t expanded by more than 2% annually since 2013 and has battled to create jobs, with the unemployment rate persisting near a 15-year high in the third quarter as the economy struggles to recover from a recession. The manufacturing sector, which comprises about 13 percent of gross domestic product, lost 25 000 positions in the period. The business cycle in South Africa is in its longest downward phase since records started in 1945, central bank data show. An index tracking South African manufacturing activity fell to a 14-month low of 43.2 in September, a compiled by the Stellenbosch-based Bureau for Economic Research for Absa Group.

� L.P