look news india
Mumbai: According to the quarterly survey conducted by FICCI, the sentiments of the manufacturing sector in the country have improved in the first quarter of the current financial year. According to the survey report, in the first quarter of the last financial year, 57 percent of all respondents said they had increased production, while in the first quarter of the current financial year, this figure was 78 percent.
Domestic demand also remained optimistic in the first quarter of the current financial year as can be seen from the order book.
Sixty-six per cent of those surveyed expected order numbers to remain high. The survey covered managers of manufacturing units across eight major sectors.
These eight sectors include automotive and auto components, capital goods and machine tools, cement, chemicals, fertilisers and pharma, electronics and electricals, metals and textiles.
This information was collected from large and SME manufacturing units. The current capacity utilisation level in the manufacturing sector is 75 per cent, which indicates stability in economic activities. The investment scenario is also positive. 41 per cent of the people who participated in the survey have plans for investment and expansion in the next six months.
However, some manufacturers said they were facing challenges such as high interest rates on working capital, slow payments by customers, difficulty in getting skilled labour and cheap imports. Logistics problems also limit expansion efforts. The outlook for hiring employees was positive.
