Chief statistician Uzir Mahidin said the IPI regained positive momentum in October recording 2.7% year-on-year growth compared to a negative 0.5% registered in the previous month.

“The increase in October 2023, which was the highest since May 2023, was driven by the robust performance in the mining sector at 8.7% (September 2023: -5.2%).

“In the meantime, the growth of the electricity and manufacturing sectors continued, with 5.8% (September 2023: 2.5%) and 0.9% (September 2023: 0.4%) respectively,” he said in a statement.

Uzir elaborated that the increase in the manufacturing output in October 2023 was underpinned by the expansion in the domestic-oriented industries by 6.7% (September 2023: 5.8%).

Meanwhile, on a month-on-month comparison, the IPI rose by 2.2%, marking a rise for three consecutive months following the 1.1% rise recorded in September 2023.

Concluding his statement on the IPI performance for the first 10 months of 2023, Uzir said the IPI expanded at a slower rate of 1.0% compared to the same period of the previous year (January-October 2022: 7.3%) with all sectors posting positive growth, namely the electricity index (2.1%); manufacturing index (1.1%); and mining index (0.6%).