BERLIN, July 18 (Xinhua) -- New customer orders received by companies in the German manufacturing industry rose again in May, official figures published on Wednesday by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) showed.
According to the Wiesbaden-based government agency, price- and seasonally-adjusted orders in the key sector of the German economy were up by 0.6 percent in May compared to April. The stock of outstanding domestic deliveries hereby rose by 0.3 percent while outstanding deliveries to international customers increased by 0.8 percent.
Broken down into manufacturing sub-categories, the data compiled by the Federal Statistical Office revealed that producers of consumer goods recorded the biggest monthly increase in the volume of orders by 1.3 percent, followed by intermediate goods producers and capital goods producers with gains of 0.6 percent and 0.5 percent respectively.
The Federal Statistical Office noted that German companies in the manufacturing industry could currently keep operating at the same capacity for 5.6 months to service outstanding orders without generating any new sales from April onwards. The figure thus remained stable after having already measured a 5.6 month "reach" of outstanding orders under this definition back in April and March.
Whilst only marking a relatively modest overall increase, the continued upward trend in total manufacturing orders appeared to defy some concerns over a cooling of economic momentum in Germany and the wider world.
Speaking to Xinhua on Wednesday, Thiess Petersen, senior economics expert at the Bertelsmann Foundation, highlighted however, that the growth prospects for Germany in the remainder of the year had weakened significantly. In spite of the resilience of manufacturing orders in May, German industrial manufacturers remained particularly sensitive to the erection of new trade barriers due to their strong emphasis on exports to international markets.
Petersen noted that the German Central Bank (Bundesbank) had recently downgraded its forecast for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth to between 1.8 percent and 2.0 percent for 2018. Aside from the external risks posed by a raft of protectionist measures adopted by U.S. President Donald Trump, the Frankfurt-based institute pointed to domestic skilled labor shortages as further contributing to the dampened outlook.
"GDP growth in the area of two percent would still be a good result for German businesses in light of several uncertainties faced by the global economy", the Bertelsmann expert said.
