Canada's chemical plant capacity utilisation rises to 82.1% in Q3

15 December 2011 15:37  [Source: ICIS news]

TORONTO (ICIS)--Capacity utilisation in Canada’s chemical industry rose by 4.4 percentage points to 82.1% in the third quarter from the second, a statistics agency said on Thursday.

“The chemical manufacturing industry saw its capacity utilisation increase from 77.7% [in the second quarter] to 82.1%, mainly as a result of the expanded production of pharmaceuticals and medicine,” Ottawa-based Statistics Canada said in a report.

Meanwhile, third quarter plant utilisation in Canada’s plastics and rubber industry was 74.8%, down 1.1 percentage points from the second quarter, the agency said.

Overall capacity plant utilisation in Canada’s manufacturing sector rose by 1.6 percentage points to 81.1% in the third quarter, led by increased production in the motor vehicle and parts sector, which recovered from a decline in the second quarter because of Japan’s earthquake and tsunami disaster, the agency said.

Compared with the third quarter of 2010, capacity utilisation in Canada's chemical industry was up by 7.9 percentage points, while the plastics and rubber sector saw a 4.2 percentage point increase.

Overall Canadian manufacturing plant utilisation was up 4.3 percentage points year on year from the 2010 third quarter.

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By: Stefan Baumgarten
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