Selected economy indicators - March, April 2011

Selected economic indicators

The industrial production as well as construction output slowed down the year on year growths. In March, the volume of exports grew faster than imports; the surplus of the trade balance was the highest since the foundation of the Czech Republic.
In April compared with March, the m-o-m consumer prices level increased, the inter-annual gain of prices decelerated. Number of registered unemployed people went down, the registered unemployment rate decreased both inter-monthly and inter-annually.

MARCH 2011

INDUSTRY
The y-o-y volume of industrial production in March was higher by 9.5% really. The largest contribution to the overall increase, 3.8 percentage points, belongs mainly to manufacture of motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers (the growth by more than a fifth), 1.4 p.p. brought manufacture of fabricated metal products (growth by 17.1%) and 1.3 p.p. manufacture of machinery and equipment (growth by 16.4%). A downward effect on the growth (-0.5 p.p.) came from the drop of electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply (by 5.0%). The seasonally adjusted volume of industrial production decreased inter-monthly by 0.9%.

Sales from industrial activity at current prices increased y-o-y by 10.7 %, direct export sales by 19.5 % and domestic sales including indirect export sales of non-industrial enterprises grew only by 3.0%. The share of direct export sales in total sales of industrial enterprises made up 50.4%, which was by 3.7 p.p. more than a year ago.

The average registered number of employees ¹ in enterprises with 50+ employees increased by 4.2% inter-annually. Their average monthly nominal wage reached CZK 25 990 and rose by 4.5% nominally and by 2.8% really.

The value of new orders in selected industrial CZ-NACE activities raised by 9.7% y-o-y. Non-domestic new orders increased by 18.9% but the value of domestic new orders came down by 4.6%.

In the first quarter of 2011, compared to the same period of 2010, industrial production increased by 12.7%, after working days adjustment by 11.7% (the first quarter 2011 was one working day longer than the first quarter 2010). Sales from industrial activity rose by 12.9% at current prices and direct export sales by 21.8%. Number of employees in enterprises with 50+ employees increased by 4.1%, the average monthly nominal wage reached CZK 24 643, going up nominally by 4.2% and really by 2.5%.


CONSTRUCTION

In March, the y-o-y volume of construction production went up by 4.6% in real terms. The buildings increased by 3.1%, the civil engineering works by 8.9%. The results were again mainly affected by the low comparative base of the previous year. The construction production (after seasonal adjustment) increased by 2.6% m-o-m.

The construction of 2 404 dwellings started, which was by 1.5% more than a year ago, on the contrary the number of completed dwellings reduced by almost than a third to 1 946 dwellings.

The average registered number of employees ¹ in construction enterprises with 50+ employees went down by 2.1% y-o-y. Their average monthly nominal wage reached CZK 28 068 and came up by 2.1% nominally and by 0.4% really.

In the first quarter of 2011 the y-o-y construction production at current prices was higher by 5.9% really, after working days adjustment by 5,4% (the first quarter 2011 was one working day longer than the first quarter 2010). The civil engineering works increased by 3.1% and buildings by 7.0%. In enterprises with 50+ employees, the number of employees came down by 2.0% and their average nominal wage reached CZK 26 094, going up nominally by 2.5% and really by 0.8%. The number of started dwellings increased by 7.1%, while the number of completed dwellings fell by more than a third (by 33.6%).


EXTERNAL TRADE ²

In March, the y-o-y volume of exports increased by 17.9%, the volume of imports by 17.4%. Higher growth rate of imports over the growth rate of exports ended after twelve successive months. The trade balance showed a surplus of CZK 21.5 bn in March. The surplus was inter-annually higher by CZK 4.2 bn and attained the highest monthly amount since 1993. The trade balance with EU member states was active. It reached CZK 63.7 bn, which was about CZK 13.5 bn more than the previous year. The trade balance with non-EU countries was passive (CZK 42.2 bn) whereas in March 2010, the debit was by CZK 9.3 bn more favourable. The trade balance was positively affected mainly by growth of surplus in trade with machinery and transport equipment.

After seasonal adjustment, m-o-m volume of exports did not change and m-o-m volume of imports grew by 0.2%.

In the first quarter of 2011, compared to the same period of 2010, exports grew by 21.6% and imports by 22.4%. Trade balance surplus of CZK 52.9 bn was higher by CZK 5.6 bn inter-annually.


APRIL 2011

CONSUMER PRICES

In April, compared with March, total consumer prices level increased by 0.3%. In total, prices of goods increased by 0.3% and prices of services did not change. The main components with the highest growth rate were: clothing and footwear (by 2.7%), food and non-alcoholic beverages (by 0.4%) and transport (by 0.5%, including fuel by 1.7%). On the contrary, the alcoholic beverages, tobacco noted the biggest price decrease (by 0.4%). In terms of the y-o-y comparison, consumer prices rose by 1.6% (by 1.7% in March). The price level increase was influenced mainly by food and non-alcoholic beverages (by 0.7 p.p., price increase by 3.8%) and by housing, water, energy and fuel (by 0.5 p.p., price increase by 2.1%).

Inflation rate, expressed as the increase of the average consumer price index for last 12 months related to the average CPI for the previous 12 months, was 1.8% in April. Living costs (imputed rentals not involved) in households of pensioners went up by 2.8%.

The y-o-y growth of harmonized index of consumer prices in the Czech Republic (provisional data) slowed down to 1.6% in April (the Eurostat flash estimate for Euroarea was 2.8%).


UNEMPLOYMENT

The registered unemployment rate (according to the Ministry of Social Affairs) decreased by 0.6 percentage point in April and was 8.6% at the end of month. The unemployment rate of men went down by 0.8 p.p. to 7.8%, the unemployment rate of women by 0.3 p.p. to 9.7%. In comparison with the end of April 2010, the registered unemployment rate decreased by 0.5 p.p.

At the end of April, the number of unemployed people registered by labour offices decreased to 513.8 thousand persons which was by 33.9 thousand less inter-monthly and by 26.3 thousand persons less than inter-annually. Even if the number of unemployed new graduated students and youths went slightly down in m-o-m comparison, their share in total number of unemployed remained still at 6.2% (it was 6.1% at the end of March 2010). The number of free job opportunities raised in both m-o-m and y-o-y comparisons and amounted to 36.1 thousand. The number of applicants per one job opportunity was 14.3 persons, representing both inter-monthly as well as inter-annual improvement.


This press release was not edited for language.

________________________________________

¹ The indicator registered number of employees does not include: persons working under various contracts for work, working owners of enterprises and cooperating household members, who do not have contracts of employment. Data on the registered number of employees in industry (construction) also exclude agency workers, who have contracts of employment, however, not within the industry (construction).
² In ‘border statistics’ concept

---

Published: 13.04.2011
The data are valid as of the release date of the publication.