Canada chem capacity utilisation rises to 82.1% in first quarter

15 June 2010 15:47  [Source: ICIS news]

TORONTO (ICIS news)--Capacity utilisation at Canadian-based chemical plants rose to 82.1% in the first quarter, driven by increased production in pharmaceuticals as well as petrochemicals, a government statistics agency said in a report on Tuesday.

Year over year, chemical plant capacity utilisation rose by 12.3 percentage points from 69.8% in the 2009 first quarter. Sequentially, chemical plant utilisation rose by 5.4 percentage points from 76.7% in the 2009 fourth quarter, Statistics Canada said.

The increase in chemicals compared with overall capacity utilisation in Canada’s manufacturing sector of 75.0% in the first quarter – up from 66.8% in the 2009 first quarter and 70.7% in the 2009 fourth quarter.

In addition to chemicals, the main contributors to the increase in manufacturing capacity utilisation were transportation equipment, primary metals, and machinery manufacturing, the agency said.

The agency also noted that capacity utilisation in Canada’s large oil and gas industry fell to 76.2% in the first quarter - down from 77.0% in the 2009 fourth quarter and 80.4% in the 2009 first quarter. The decline was mainly due to lower crude extraction, which offset higher activity at natural gas facilities.

In related industry news, Canadian chemical railcar shipments are up by 27.3% to 320,838 year to date to 5 June, from 251,987 in the same period in 2009, according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR).

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By: Stefan Baumgarten
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