The slogan in GAZ automobile works reads: The line is activated."
Photo: Sergey Mikheev
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Industry Generates Above Schedule Growth
The February rates of industrial growth proved beyond all expectations in Russia. According to Federal Statistics Service, the industry accelerated 8.7 percent in February vs. the growth of 1.1 percent posted a year earlier. Nevertheless, Economic Development Ministry is in no hurry to upgrade the 2007 outlook. The matter at stake could be purely statistical improvement.
Russia’s industry was clearly accelerating in the first two months of this year, having stepped up 8.4 percent on year in January (vs. 4.4 percent in January of 2006) and 8.7 percent in February (vs. 1.1 percent). According to official statistics, the two-month growth reached 8.6 percent vs. just 2.7 percent posted a year earlier.
But the root cause of this healthy growth wasn’t the boom in economy but rather the effect of low base of early 2006. “The beginning of 2006 was very bad for the industry,” said Vladimir Salnikov from Center of Macroeconomic Analysis and Short-Term Forecasting. “It was very cold, the rates of food industry slowed down on epopee with alcohol excise stamps, construction rates slowed down...”
So, in the Economic Development Ministry, they don’t feel like revising the 4.3 percent outlook for this year’s industrial advance (2006 growth stood at 3.9 percent). “We won’t reconsider the forecasts yet. The first two months of the past year failed to reflect trends of the whole 2006,” explained Gennady Kuranov, who is the deputy director of consolidated macroeconomic forecasting department.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Mar. 19, 2007
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