The industrial production in Qatar surged 6 percent month-on-month in May as a result of the expansion in the extraction of hydrocarbons and desalination as well as in the production of refined petroleum products, basic metals, chemicals and beverages, as per the Planning and Statistics Authority (PSA).
In May 2021, Qatar’s Industrial Production Index (IPI) saw a yearly increase of 1.7 percent, which was mainly contributed by cement, mining and quarrying (other than hydrocarbons), refined petroleum products and rubber and plastics, despite the continuation of certain COVID-19 related restrictions.
The PSA introduced IPI, a short-term quantitative index that measures the changes in the volume of production of a selected basket of industrial products over a given period with respect to a base period 2013.
The mining and quarrying index, which has a relative weight of 83.6 percent in the IPI basket, saw a 5.9 percent increase month-on-month owing to a 5.9 percent expansion in the extraction of crude petroleum and natural gas, even as there was a 3.8 percent decline in other mining and quarrying sectors.
The index showed a 0.3 percent surge on a yearly basis, owing to a 0.7 percent increase in the extraction of crude petroleum and natural gas and 35.4 percent in other mining and quarrying sectors.
The manufacturing index, with a relative weight of 15.2 percent, expanded 5.5 percent on a monthly basis in May 2021 on account of a 7.2 percent rise in refined petroleum products, 7 percent in basic metals, 5.9 percent in chemicals and chemical products, 5.3 percent in beverages and 0.4 percent in food products. But, there was an 8.8 percent decline in printing and reproduction of recorded media, 5.5 percent in cement and other non-metallic mineral products and 2.2 percent in rubber and plastics products.
In May, the manufacturing index shot up 7.7 percent on a yearly basis, owing to a 55.3 percent surge in the production of cement and other non-metallic mineral products, 29.6 percent in basic metals, 25.3 percent in refined petroleum products and 16.9 percent in rubber and plastic products.
Nevertheless, there was a 10.9 percent contraction in the production of beverages, 7 percent in food products and 1.2 percent in chemicals and chemical products.
Electricity, which has a 0.7 percent weight in the IPI basket, saw its index soar 36 percent and 9.4 percent on a monthly and yearly basis respectively this May. In the case of water, which has a 0.5 percent weight, there was a 7 percent increase month-on-month but registered a 19.8 percent shrinkage year-on-year in May 2021.
