provided that this confirms temper Eric Dubois

Everything is more uniformly black. After five months of sharp decline, and average monthly decline exceeding 3, manufacturing has almost stabilized ( 0.1) in February, according to the index published Friday by Insee. "It is rather better than what we expected", observes Eric Dubois, head of the Department of the environment in the Insee.

Upstream production, intermediate goods, which, among the major sectors of activity, accuse the highest drop of one quarter on the other ( 13.7), know even a rebound in February ( 0.5). "It is a positive factor... provided that this confirms," temper Eric Dubois.

Technical rebound

In fact, the industrial activity of the month of January was revised in sharp decline to 5 for manufacturing production, instead of 4.1 initially announced. The February stabilization is therefore extremely low levels: over a year, the decline in manufacturing output reached 17.8, when it had not exceeded 6.8 at the height of the previous recession in 1993.

Stabilization of February from January is, in part, to a technical rebound associated with times of activity after closures of production units. This is the case of the shipbuilding sector, note the Insee. Conversely, the activity of the automotive sector is distributed down in February ( 5.6), after his January bounce. Over a year, the collapse reaches a lower new history, with a decline in the production of 45.9! Sales of new cars, however, recorded a rebound of more than 8 in March linked largely to the premium case which could augurer opportunities for producing these next few months.

But since February, other companies, all sectors, have announced closures of sites (Arcelor, Trier...). And some sectors, such as mechanics, have seen activity continue to deteriorate in March (see below).

Finally, among the main partners, the fall in industrial production has certainly slowed also in Germany in February, but it remains significant ( 2.9 after 6.1 in January). And she reached 3.5 in Italy.

Movement of disinflation

If industrial activity remains stable in France in March, production will have even dropped by 7.6 in the first quarter from the last quarter of 2008. The construction industry, him also, still suffered at the beginning of year (read here), the industry of the building not yet benefiting from the stimulus plan. And the first signal of stabilization in housing starts in February will not immediately seen in the activity statistics.

While the Bank of France table on a decline of GDP "limited" to 0.8 in the first quarter, the Insee is thus not, him, reason to reduce its forecast of a decline in GDP of 1.5, which would therefore be more profound than that recorded in the fourth quarter ( 1.1).

If the production to stabilize sustainably, some economists also anticipate a resistance of consumption in the coming months. Professionals, they appear to be uncertain about the direction of their sector (read below). Disinflation movement resumed last month: If the consumer prices increased by 0.2 in March, according to the index published Friday by Insee, strong increases in the last year make the favourable comparison over a year: inflation is now limited to 0.3, a lower for ten years.