The metallurgical activity It registered an interannual variation of -17.7% during March and compared to February of this year it decreased by -2.8%. The report was prepared by the Department of Economic Studies of the Association of Metallurgical Industrialists of the Argentine Republic (ADIMRA).
During the first three months of the year the sector accumulates a contraction of -6.6% and similarly, the utilization of installed capacity decreased more than 10 percentage points compared to the same period of the previous year, reaching one of the lowest levels of the last 8 years, being surpassed only by the hardest 4 months of the 2020 pandemic.
Metallurgical activity: how was the performance sector by sector
At the sector level, the year-on-year drop in March has been replicated in all areas that make up the metallurgical framework with contractions of up to more than 20%.
The sector of Capital Goods (-18.3%), Foundry (-20.4%) and Electrical Equipment (-19.7%) have been among the most affected during the current month, with falls that exceed the general average while the Agricultural Machinery (-13.3%) It was one of the sectors that have fallen the least during the month, influenced by the recovery of some companies in the province of Buenos Aires.
This month it was once again observed that, in relative terms, the companies linked to the oil, gas and mining chain are the ones that have recorded the smallest contractions and on the other hand, those linked to the construction and final consumption chains have registered the strongest decreases in the period analyzed.
The president of ADIMRA, Elio Del Re, warned that “Production will continue to decline in line with domestic demand and the use of installed capacity, so it is necessary to promote investment but with a vision of promoting the development of the national industry” and emphasized the importance of “preventing sectoral emergencies and pressures from promoting the import of equipment produced as stipulated ‘the Large Investment Regime presented in the draft Base Law’.
Metallurgical activity: analysis by province
In the provincial analysis, the drop has also been generalized with considerable variability. In this sense, Santa Fe continues to be the province most affected by the influence of the agricultural machinery sector where, at the moment, there is no recovery. In Buenos Aires, on the contrary, a recovery in the agricultural machinery sector would seem to begin to be seen since, although a contraction was also recorded, it was less than that of Santa Fe.
On the other handthe two provinces that have recorded the smallest falls have been Mendoza and Entre Ríos. In both cases, some companies in the Capital Goods sector have influenced this result.
How was the performance of exports and imports in metallurgical activity?
With respect to the exportDuring March of this year, they recorded a total amount of 380 million USD and fell -5.4% compared to the previous year. The imports, For their part, they were 1,610 million USD and had a negative interannual variation of -39.5%.
Despite the strong contractions in activity observed in recent months, a situation of such magnitude has not yet been observed in the level of employment provided by companies in the sector. If we compare against the previous month, employment contracted -0.5%, but relative stability has been observed since mid-2022.
Source: Ambito
