After three consecutive months in the negative, national industry prices changed 0.06% from January to February. With this result, the Producer Price Index (IPP) accumulated a drop of 5.16% in 12 months. In the year, there is an accumulated variation of -0.18%. The data was released this Tuesday, 2, by IBGE.
The positive monthly result was disseminated by 14 of the 24 activities investigated in the research. On this positive side, the sectors that contributed most to the general index were metallurgy (0.12 percentage points), extractive industries (0.09 pp) and oil refining and biofuels (0.08 pp).
In the metallurgy sector, prices rose 2.03% compared to January, the third positive result in a row. This rate was the highest for the activity since May 2022 (2.05%). The biggest influences on the increase came from products from the non-ferrous metals group, which have been affected by exchange rate and input variations.
In the extractive industries (1.79%), there was inflation for the third consecutive month. In the year, the sector accumulates an increase of 6.52%. “In this activity, Brazil follows the movement of prices in the international market and they have been increasing. The depreciation of the real against the dollar intensifies this even further”, says IBGE analysis and methodology manager, Alexandre Brandão. In turn, in oil refining and biofuels (0.74%), the positive change was mainly influenced by the increase in the price of ethyl alcohol. “The products that weigh most heavily on this activity are petroleum derivatives, such as diesel oil and gasoline, but the biggest impact this time came from ethyl alcohol, due to the temporary difficulty of grinding sugar cane in certain areas”, he analyzes.
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Despite the increase in the month, the main highlight was the food sector (-1.42%), which, in general, exerted the greatest influence on the national index (-0.35 pp). The result of this activity was impacted by drop in the prices of products derived from soy, rice and fresh beef.
“There was the arrival of the soybean and rice harvest and an increase in the number of cattle for slaughter. This makes prices cheaper for the industry”, explains Brandão. “If it weren’t for the negative result of the food sector, which accounts for around 25% of the industry, the index would have grown more in February”, he adds.
In February, the major economic categories had the following behavior: capital goods (-1.05%); intermediate goods (0.12%); and consumer goods (0.21%). In this last category, there was a change of 0.23% in durable consumer goods (BCD) and 0.20% in semi-durable and non-durable consumer goods (BCND).
