Singapore's manufacturing output down for 12th month

Singapore's manufacturing output declined marginally by 0.5 percent in January on a yearly basis, the 12th consecutive month of decline, said the country's Economic Development Board (EDB) on Friday.

Excluding biomedical manufacturing, manufacturing output fell 7 percent year-on-year, according to an EDB press release.

On a seasonally adjusted month-on-month basis, manufacturing output increased 9.3 percent in January compared with the previous month. Excluding biomedical manufacturing, the output grew 4.4 percent.

Output of the biomedical manufacturing cluster grew 28.9 percent in January on a year-on-year basis. Among them, the pharmaceuticals segment grew 34.3 percent with higher production of active pharmaceutical ingredients and biological products. The medical technology segment increased 10.8 percent, on the back of higher export demand for medical devices.

Output of the electronics cluster increased 1.7 percent in January 2016 compared to the same month last year. Growth in the cluster was supported by higher output in the other electronic modules & components and semiconductors segments. The rest of the electronic segments registered output declines.

The chemicals cluster's output fell 3.7 percent on a year-on-year basis. The specialties and other chemicals segments grew while the petroleum and petrochemicals segments registered lower volume of production mainly due to plant maintenance shutdowns, according to EDB. Endit