The Monthly
Survey of Manufacturing, released by Statistics Canada on Thursday, showed that
Canadian manufacturing sales increased 0.2 per cent m-o-m in January 2024 to
CAD72.13 billion, following a downwardly revised 1.1 per cent m-o-m fall (from -0.7 per cent m-o-m) in December 2023.
Economists
had forecast a gain of 0.4 per cent m-o-m for January.
According to
the survey, 11 of 21 industries posted increases in sales in January, led by apparel
manufacturing (+13.0 per cent m-o-m), miscellaneous manufacturing (+10.0 per
cent m-o-m), transportation equipment (+4.3 per cent m-o-m) and chemical (+3.5 per
cent m-o-m) subsectors. On
the contrary, the leather and allied product (-8.4 per cent m-o-m), furniture
and related product (-8.2 per cent m-o-m), and fabricated metal product (-5.8
per cent m-o-m) industries logged the biggest declines.
Overall, sales
of non-durable goods climbed 0.8 per cent m-o-m in January, while sales of
durable goods decreased 0.3 per cent m-o-m.
In y-o-y terms,
manufacturing sales fell 4.3 per
cent in January.