Manufacturing: Business Expectations Brighten

The business climate indicator rose slightly in manufacturing. This was due to the improved business outlook for the months ahead. Very good assessments of the current business situation were scaled back only marginally. Export expectations, however, continued to cloud over. After six successive increases, staffing plans were only slightly growth-oriented. Capacity utilisation rates edged downwards by 0.1 percentage points to 84.2%, putting them above the figure for the same period last year and the historical average.