
Infrastructure sector growth at 10-month low
Why in the news ?
- Affected by decline in production of crude oil and natural gas, the growth in eight infrastructure industries dropped to a 10-month low of 3.6% in May.
More on news
- According to the data released by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, the eight sectors, which also include coal, refinery products, fertilizers, steel and cement, had expanded by 3.9% in May 2017.
- This is the lowest growth rate since July 2017 when infrastructure industries had expanded by 2.9%.
- The growth rate recorded in April 2018 stood higher at 4.6%.
- Crude oil and natural gas registered a contraction of 2.9% and 1.4% respectively in May compared with the same period a year earlier.
- The output for both coal and fertilizer grew by 12.1% and 8.4% respectively, in May over the year earlier period.
- In April and May this year, the eight industries recorded 4.1% growth compared with 3.3% a year earlier.
- However, the growth rate for refinery products declined to 4.9% in May this year compared from 5.4% in May 2017.
- While growth rates for steel and electricity also fell to 0.5% and 3.5% respectively in May, compared with 3.8% and 8.2% in the same period of the previous year.

Source
The Hindu