Singapore's industrial production witnessed significant growth in August, driven largely by the robust performance within the electronics sector, according to preliminary data from the Economic Development Board released on Thursday.
Industrial production surged by 21.0 percent year-over-year in August, following a 2.0 percent increase in July. This figure surpassed economists' expectations, who had anticipated a 9.6 percent growth.
When excluding the biomedical manufacturing sector, industrial production experienced a substantial annual growth of 27.5 percent in August, compared to the 3.6 percent increase observed in the previous month.
On a month-to-month basis, industrial production rose by 6.7 percent after a 10.3 percent climb in July.
Breaking down the major sectors, the electronics output showed the most remarkable growth, increasing by 49.1 percent annually in August. This was bolstered by a higher electronics demand and a relatively low semiconductor production base during the same month last year.
The chemical sector also saw a rise in output by 11.1 percent, while the precision engineering sector's output advanced by 7.9 percent.
Conversely, the output from the biomedical manufacturing sector contracted by 16.1 percent.
