Other vehicle construction increased by 0.4 percent.
(Photo: imago/photothek)
Berlin The backlog of orders in German industry is getting thicker again. In February, the order backlog in manufacturing grew by 0.5 percent compared to the previous month, as the Federal Statistical Office announced on Thursday. At the beginning of the year there had been a decline. Compared to the same month last year, the order backlog was 0.9 percent higher after calendar adjustments.
“The order backlog remains at a very respectable level,” commented the chief economist at Hauck Aufhäuser Lampe Privatbank AG, Alexander Krüger, on the development. “However, there is still no trigger that would allow orders to be processed more quickly.”
According to the statistics office, the positive development in the order backlog can be seen in most areas of the manufacturing industry.
Above all, the manufacturers of data processing equipment, electronic and optical products (+1.9 percent) and motor vehicles and motor vehicle parts (+0.7 percent) reported above-average growth.
Other vehicle construction increased by 0.4 percent. This includes, among other things, the construction of ships, rail vehicles, aircraft and spacecraft as well as the manufacture of military combat vehicles.
The range of the order backlog also increased in February: it is now at 7.5 months, after 7.4 in January. The range indicates how many months the companies would theoretically have to produce without new orders if the turnover remained the same in order to process the existing orders.
For manufacturers of capital goods such as machines and vehicles and producers of intermediate goods, the range remained unchanged at 10.7 and 3.8 months, respectively. For consumer goods manufacturers, the range increased slightly to 3.5 months.
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