Infra Growth Dips To 2.3%...

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><root available-locales="en_US," default-locale="en_US"><static-content language-id="en_US"><![CDATA[Hit by the global financial meltdown, the key infrastructure sector industries showed poor performance during December, registering a dismal growth of 2.3 per cent, a trend which economists feel is likely to continue during the remaining part of the fiscal. With steel and crude oil showing negative growth during the month, six infrastructure industries in December recorded the second-lowest growth during 2008-09, marginally up from 1.8 per cent in November. Commenting on the growth rate, NCAER Director General Suman Bery said, "Sectors, particularly electricity and coal, might be affected because of problems of supply in general... the numbers do suggest slowing of the economy." The core sectors with a weight of 26.7 per cent in the overall index of industrial production (IIP), expanded by 3.2 per cent in December last year. Reeling under the demand recession, steel took the hit and registered a negative trend of 0.8 per cent. However, petroleum refining products grew at 3 per cent against 1.9 per cent in a year-ago period. The core sector data released today showed that crude oil production remained in the negative territory showing a decline of 0.3 per cent in December. For the nine-month period of April-December, the growth of the infrastructure sector - crude oil, petroleum refinery products, coal, electricity, cement and finished steel - dropped to 3.5 per cent from 5.9 per cent in the same period of 2007-08. Principal Economist of Crisil D K Joshi, however, said the industry as whole is expected to post poor growth in the remaining months of the fiscal. (PTI)