Canada chemical sales fall 2.5% in February as volumes drop

17 April 2012 15:14  [Source: ICIS news]

TORONTO (ICIS)--Canadian chemical sales fell 2.5% in February from January, to Canadian dollar (C$) $4.0bn ($4.0bn), reflecting lower volumes by a large number of producers, a statistics agency said on Tuesday.

Compared with February 2011, Canada’s chemical sales were up 3.9% year on year, Ottawa-based Statistics Canada said.

Meanwhile, sales in Canada’s plastics and rubber industries fell 2.6% to C$2.0bn in February from January but were up 8.6% year on year from February 2011.

Overall Canadian manufacturing sales fell 0.3% to C$49.1bn in February from January as a number of sectors - including motor vehicle assembly, vehicle parts, and food - recorded declines.

Compared with February 2011, Canadian manufacturing sales were up 6.3% year on year.

Manufacturing inventories rose 0.3% in February to C$65.8bn, the 16th gain in 17 months.

The inventory-to-sales ratio was 1.34 in February, up from 1.33 in January. The ratio measures the time, in months, that would be required to exhaust inventories if sales were to remain at their current level.

In related news, a rail industry trade group said last week that Canadian chemical railcar traffic in the period from 1 January to 7 April was down 12.9% year on year.

($1 = C$0.99)

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