Monthly Survey of Manufacturing
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Manufacturing sales increased 1.9% (+$877 million) in March to $47.5 billion, following a 1.8% decline in February. The transportation equipment industry (+6.3%) accounted for just over half of the gain. Sales also rose in the machinery and paper industries.
Higher sales were reported in 15 of 21 industries, representing 80.0% of total manufacturing.
Constant dollar manufacturing sales rose 1.9% in March.
Despite the decline in February, manufacturing sales in the first quarter increased 4.0% compared with the last three months of 2010. Sales for the first quarter ($141.6 billion) were also the highest since the third quarter of 2008 ($154.9 billion), before the economic downturn began. Including the first quarter of 2011, sales have advanced for seven consecutive quarters.
Note to readers
All data in this release are seasonally adjusted and are expressed in current dollars unless otherwise specified.
Statistics Canada is releasing revised monthly manufacturing data this month in accordance with standard practices. Sales of goods manufactured, inventories, and orders in current and constant dollars have been revised back to January 2007 for unadjusted data and to January 2004 for seasonally adjusted data.
The revisions were based on three sources. The monthly data were compared to the latest information available from the Annual Survey of Manufactures and Logging (ASML). Revisions were made based on new information from respondents, the availability of more up-to-date administrative data, and through reconciliation with the ASML data. The seasonal adjustment parameters were also reviewed and updated.
The revised data are now available on CANSIM.
Non-durable goods industries include food, beverage and tobacco products, textile mills, textile product mills, clothing, leather and allied products, paper, printing and related support activities, petroleum and coal products, chemicals, and plastics and rubber products.
Durable goods industries include wood products, non-metallic mineral products, primary metal, fabricated metal products, machinery, computer and electronic products, electrical equipment, appliances and components, transportation equipment, furniture and related products and miscellaneous manufacturing.
Production-based industries
For the aerospace industry and shipbuilding industries, the value of production is used instead of sales of goods manufactured. This value is calculated by adjusting monthly sales of goods manufactured by the monthly change in inventories of goods in process and finished products manufactured.
Unfilled orders are a stock of orders that will contribute to future sales assuming that the orders are not cancelled.
New orders are those received whether sold in the current month or not. New orders are measured as the sum of sales for the current month plus the change in unfilled orders from the previous month to the current month.
Sales increase in the transportation equipment industry
In the aerospace product and parts industry, production rose 20.6% to $1.4 billion. Sales in the motor vehicle industry advanced 4.1%, as a result of increases reported by most auto assembly plants. Sales in the motor vehicle industry have risen in 8 of the past 12 months.
Sales were up 4.2% in the machinery industry to $2.7 billion. Since their most recent low of $2.1 billion in October 2009, sales have advanced in 14 of 17 months. This advance partly reflects rising sales in the agricultural, construction and mining machinery industry.
Sales also increased in the paper (+4.0%), food (+0.8%), furniture and related product (+5.7%) and computer and electronic product (+3.9%) industries.
Manufacturing sales up in most provinces
In March, nine provinces posted higher sales compared with February, led by Quebec and Alberta.
In Quebec, sales advanced 2.0% to $11.6 billion. The increase was caused by higher production in the aerospace product and parts industry (+31.1%). An 11.9% decline in the chemical industry, stemming from lower sales in the pharmaceutical and medicine industry, partly offset the gain.
Sales increased 3.7% in Alberta to $5.7 billion in March. The increase largely reflected a 6.2% rise in the chemical industry and a price-driven 3.6% advance in petroleum and coal products. A 7.9% increase in the machinery industry, largely stemming from higher sales of agricultural, construction and mining machinery, also contributed to the gain.
Sales increases in Newfoundland and Labrador (+25.8%) and Nova Scotia (+10.4%) reflected gains in non-durable goods industries in both provinces.
Sales edged up 0.1% to $21.4 billion in Ontario, led by a 4.7% increase in the motor vehicle industry. The machinery, furniture, computer and electronic product and printing industries also contributed to the increase. However, declines of 10.1% in the petroleum and coal products industry and 21.8% in the miscellaneous manufacturing industry offset almost all of the gains.
Inventory levels continue to increase
Inventory levels were up 2.1% to $62.0 billion, the sixth consecutive monthly rise. Although 15 of 21 industries posted higher inventory levels, most of the increase stemmed from a 21.3% advance in the petroleum and coal products industry. The increase was related to higher volumes of raw materials and finished product inventories reported by some refineries, as well as an 8.2% advance in the price of petroleum and coal products as recorded by the Industrial Product Price Index.
Higher inventory levels were also reported by manufacturers in the fabricated metal (+3.2%), computer and electronic (+3.4%), machinery (+1.3%) and wood product (+2.1%) industries.
A 1.6% decline in inventories in the primary metal industry offset a small portion of the national increase.
The inventory-to-sales ratio remained unchanged at 1.30 in March compared with February. The ratio has declined gradually over the past year after falling sharply in 2009.
Unfilled orders increase strongly
Unfilled orders increased 9.5% in March to $57.3 billion, the largest increase in both percentage and dollar terms since the current series began in January 1992. Unfilled orders are now at their highest level since June 2009.
The advance in unfilled orders reflected a 22.0% rise in the aerospace product and parts industry. In March, unfilled orders in the aerospace industry totalled $26.5 billion, up $4.8 billion from February.
Excluding the aerospace industry, unfilled orders in the manufacturing sector rose 0.7% to $30.8 billion. The primary metal (+8.4%), machinery (+1.3%) and fabricated metal product (+1.8%) industries contributed to the gain.
New orders increased 11.3% to $52.5 billion in March, largely reflecting gains in the aerospace industry.
Available on CANSIM: tables 304-0014, 304-0015 and 377-0008.
Table 304-0014: Canada data (sales, inventories, orders) by industry.
Table 304-0015: Provincial sales by industry.
Table 377-0008: Constant dollar sales, inventories and orders.
Definitions, data sources and methods: survey number 2101.
Data from the April Monthly Survey of Manufacturing will be released on June 15.
For more information, or to order data, contact the dissemination officer (toll-free 1-866-873-8789; 613-951-9497; fax: 613-951-3877; manufact@statcan.gc.ca). To enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact Michael Schimpf (613-951-9832, michael.schimpf@statcan.gc.ca), Manufacturing and Energy Division.
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