INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION AND CAPACITY UTILIZATION

[2005 Revision Notice Below]

Industrial production increased 0.1 percent in July after a gain of 0.8 percent in June. Manufacturing output increased 0.1 percent in July; excluding motor vehicles and parts, manufacturing production rose 0.4 percent. The output at utilities rose 0.7 percent, and production at mines declined 1.3 percent.

At 119.4 percent of its 1997 average, industrial production in July was 3.0 percent above its year-earlier level. In July, capacity utilization for total industry declined 0.1 percentage point, to 79.7 percent, a rate 1.3 percentage points below its 1972-2004 average.

r  Revised.  p  Preliminary.

       The statistics in this release cover output, capacity, and capacity utilization in the

industrial sector, which the Federal Reserve defines as manufacturing, mining, and electric and

gas utilities.  Manufacturing comprises those industries included in the North American Industry

Classification System, or NAICS, manufacturing plus the logging and newspaper, periodical,

book and directory publishing industries that have traditionally been considered manufacturing and included

in the industrial sector.

Market Groups

The output of consumer goods declined 0.5 percent in July. The production of consumer durable goods fell 1.6 percent; a drop of 2.9 percent in the output of automotive products contributed heavily to the decrease. The index for appliances, furniture, and carpeting declined 0.6 percent, and the index for home electronics recorded a rise of about the same amount. The production of consumer nondurables was unchanged. A decline in the production of paper products offset a rise in the output of clothing, and the indexes for foods and tobacco and for chemical products were unchanged. The production of consumer energy products edged down 0.1 percent.

The production of business equipment moved up 1.3 percent in July--the eighth consecutive month of increases. The index for transit equipment rose 0.2 percent; a rise in the output of medium and heavy trucks more than offset declines in the production of light motor vehicles and of civilian aircraft. The output of information processing equipment moved up 2.0 percent, and the index for industrial and other equipment rose 1.2 percent. The production of defense and space equipment moved up 1.5 percent and was 10.4 percent higher than its year-ago level. The index for construction supplies rose 0.7 percent in July, and the output of business supplies edged up 0.1 percent.

The output of materials was unchanged in July. A rise of 0.2 percent in the production of non-energy materials counterbalanced a decline of 0.7 percent in energy materials. Continued gains in the output of semiconductors boosted the index for durable goods materials, which rose 0.4 percent; the output of nondurable materials slipped 0.1 percent, as the output of paper materials and of chemical materials decreased.

Industry Groups

Production in manufacturing increased 0.1 percent in July, as a gain in the output of durables more than offset a decline in the production of nondurables. Capacity utilization in manufacturing was unchanged at 78.3 percent, a rate 1.3 percentage points above its rate a year earlier but 1.5 percentage points below its 1972-2004 average. Within durable goods manufacturing, which rose 0.4 percent, the production of motor vehicles and parts fell 2.3 percent and reversed much of its June increase. The index for nonmetallic mineral products also registered a small decline, but production for all other major categories of durables remained unchanged or increased. The largest gains--2.3 percent each--were recorded in the index for computer and electronic products, which stood 16.4 percent higher than its level a year earlier, and the index for primary metals, which turned up after three consecutive months of decline. The output of nondurable manufacturers decreased 0.2 percent; the production of petroleum and coal products fell sharply, and the indexes for paper, printing and support, and chemicals registered smaller declines. The output of non-NAICS manufacturing industries (publishing and logging) declined 0.2 percent.

Utilities output rose 0.7 percent in July as temperatures remained higher than average, and capacity utilization rose to 87.9 percent, its highest rate since February 2004. Mining output fell 1.3 percent, partly because of hurricane-related shutdowns of oil and gas platforms in the Gulf of Mexico; the operating rate declined 1.1 percentage points, to 87.5 percent.

By stage of process, capacity utilization for industries in the crude stage stepped down 1.0 percentage point, to 85.6 percent. For industries in the primary and semifinished stages, the operating rate rose 0.2 percentage point, to 80.5 percent; for industries in the finished stage, utilization was unchanged at 77.9 percent.

Revision of Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization

The Federal Reserve Board plans to issue its annual revision to the index of industrial production (IP) and the related measures of capacity and capacity utilization on November 7, 2005. The revised IP indexes will incorporate data from the 2003 Annual Survey of Manufactures and from selected editions of the 2003 and 2004 Current Industrial Reports, all from the U.S. Census Bureau. Annual data from the U.S. Geological Survey regarding metallic and nonmetallic minerals (except fuels) for 2003 and 2004 will also be introduced. The updating will include revisions to the monthly indicator for each industry (either product data or input data) and revisions to seasonal factors.

Capacity and capacity utilization will be revised to incorporate preliminary data from the Census Bureau's 2004 Survey of Plant Capacity, which covers manufacturing, along with new data on capacity from the U.S. Geological Survey, the Department of Energy, and other organizations.

Once published, the revision will be available on the Board's website at www.federalreserve.gov/releases/G17. The revised data will also be available on the website of the Department of Commerce. Further information on these revisions is available from the Board's Industrial Output Section (telephone 202-452-3197).

G.17 Release Tables:

Ascii	Screen reader	Summary: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
Chart		Chart 1: Industrial Production, Capacity, and Capacity Utilization
Chart		Chart 2: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
Chart		Chart 3: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization, High Technology Industries
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 1:Industrial Production: Market and Industry Groups (percent change)
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 2:Industrial Production: Special Aggregates and Selected Detail (percent change)
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 3: Motor Vehicle Assemblies
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 4: Industrial Production Indexes: Market and Industry Group Summary
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 5: Industrial Production Indexes: Special Aggregates
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 6: Diffusion Indexes of Industrial Production
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 7: Capacity Utilization: Manufacturing, Mining, and Utilities
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 8: Industrial Capacity: Manufacturing, Mining, and Utilities (percent change)
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 9: Industrial Production: Gross Value of Products and Nonindustrial Supplies
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 10: Gross-Value-Weighted Industrial Production: Stage-of-Process Groups
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 11: Electric Power Use: Manufacturing and Mining
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 12: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Total Industry
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 13: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Manufacturing
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 14: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Total Industry excluding Selected High-Technology Industries
Ascii	Screen reader	Table 15: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Manufacturing excluding Selected High-Technology Industries

Release dates | Historical data | Documentation
Current Monthly Release   Other formats: ASCII | PDF (144 KB)
Supplemental Monthly Release   Other formats: ASCII | PDF (144 KB)
Annual Revision Release   Other formats: ASCII | PDF (150 KB)

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