MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina's industrial activity on a recovery path

These figures dit hot happen by chance, Kulfas explained

Argentina's National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (Indec) Wednesday reported local industrial output had recorded a 15.8% growth in the year 2021, boosted by automotive and transport which showed a 50.9% increase.

Textiles, clothing, leather and footwear came in second with a 45.6% improvement, Indec also revealed.

Others with positive figures were metal products, machinery and equipment with 30.1%; non-metal minerals 29.6%; and other machines, devices and instruments, 29.3%.

Argentina's industrial activity had the best December in the last five years, with a 10.1% growth against 2020, 15.9% against 2019 and 17.6% against 2018. It was also slightly above 2017 and 2016 figures, Indec reported.

The moderate plane of this Manufacturing Industrial Production Index (IPIM) were oil refining (which includes chemicals and derivatives), rose 10%; food, beverages and tobacco 5.5%; Wood, paper, publishing and printing 4.3%; and furniture and other manufacturing industries 4.2% compared to the previous 12 months.

Economy Ministry sources said the IPIM had improved for 14 months in a row. Construction grew 30.8% in 2021, with building operations exceeding by 26.5% those of prepandemic times.

These figures were the first annual increase after three negative years, which resulted in the creation of 48,000 more jobs, according to Indec.

“We began to backtrack Macri's deindustrialization path,” due to which Argentina fell sharply among industrialized nations, Productive Development Minister Matías Kulfas explained. Indec's newest document reflected 15 of the 16 sectors surveyed had produced more than at the end of 2019, with the automotive industry standing out.

“All these improvements are not the result of chance, but the product of recovering productive policies, such as accessible credit, the development of national suppliers and the promotion of industrial parks, among many other initiatives,” Kulfas explained.

Loans granted to companies, particularly SMEs, played a key role in this new reality. “We are confident that 2022 will be a year of continuity for the very strong recovery of 2021,” the minister went on.

However, the Latin American Economic Research Foundation (FIEL) has issued a separate report according to which Argentina's industrial performance hinged on a number of conditions, such as the exchange rate and troubles accessing foreign currency, in addition to a rampant inflation and Brazil's own projections of zero or negative growth for the near future. Brazil is Argentina's main trading partner.