Bangkok, Sept. 6, (dpa/GNA) – Business output across Asia fell in August, according to a survey of around 6,000 companies operating across the region, as the coronavirus pandemic and related restrictions continued to hamper once-booming economies.
IHS Markit’s monthly purchasing managers’ index showed output up in just five of the 18 business sectors covered, the lowest since June last year and a near reversal of the revival reported earlier in the year that saw 16 sectors reporting surging output in April.
In keeping with trends since the start of the pandemic, continued growth was reported by pharmaceuticals manufacturers and “tech equipment” producers, as well as in banking and insurance.
IHS said “the fastest rates of decline” were in forestry and paper products, consumer services and construction materials.
Relative to the high virus and death numbers reported across Europe and North America last year and in early 2021, most Asian countries had kept the pandemic in check.
But many nations have been reporting significant increases in cases and deaths since March and have in turn imposed strict curbs that have caused fall-offs in output, with many governments reporting second quarter gross domestic product contractions in recent weeks.
IHS said on Friday that many of the region’s economies “continued to be hammered by escalating new Covid-19 Delta waves during August.”
Factories in Europe have in turn been forced to scale back due to related shortages of components, with Ford’s Cologne plant last week pausing production of its Fiesta model after the supply of semiconductors from virus-hit Malaysia dried up.
GNA