Taking normal seasonal variations into consideration, industrial production declined 0.9 per cent in January 1998. Industries related to the building and fitting out of oil platforms declined seven per cent in January, following a strong increase in December 1997. Compared to corrected weekly statistics, industrial production was up 4.2 per cent compared to the same month last year. The weights in the production index will be revised later this year. It may then be necessary to recalculate the 1998 figures.
The production index for oil and gas extraction, manufacturing, mining and power supply (the all-items index) went down 0.4 per cent from December 1997 to January 1998, after factoring in normal seasonal variations. The decline reflects, among other things, a modest decrease in oil and gas production and a small reduction in power production. The all-items index was 3.2 per cent higher than the same month in 1997.
Industries with energy production
Oil and gas production dropped 1.6 per cent from December 1997 to January 1998, after taking normal seasonal variations into consideration. Power production declined 1.4 per cent.
Weekly Bulletin issue no. 11, 1998