Singapore’s manufacturing increases 0.1% in August

According to data from Singapore’s Economic Development Board (EDB), Singapore’s manufacturing increased 0.1% in August following a decrease in July.

Excluding biomedical manufacturing, manufacturing posted an increase of 2.3% on the year in August.

The data showed the precision engineering cluster’s output posted the greatest rise with 11.6% on the year in August. This was followed by the electronics segment which increased 10.8% in August from a year earlier. However, the petrochemical segment decreased 17.1% in August from a year earlier. The decrease was attributed to maintenance shutdowns at some plants according to EDB.

Meanwhile, production in the chemicals segment was up 1.8% from a year earlier while the transport engineering section declined 16.8% in August, posting the largest decrease on the year among the clusters. Plus, production of the biomedical manufacturing cluster posted a fall of 8.4% from a year earlier in August while the medical technology segment increased 12.1%.

The data also revealed that the general manufacturing industries output declined 1.6% in August on a yearly basis.