KARACHI, Feb 24: Large-scale manufacturing showed negative growth in the first half of the current fiscal year, and the largest sector — textiles — recorded a negative growth of 9.6 per cent, which is more than last year. The State Bank on Thursday reported that LSM grew by minus 1.77 per cent during July-December 2011 against a positive growth of 1.4 per cent during the same period last year.

Despite a better picture on the external front, economy has yet not taken an improved shape. It is poorer than last year.

The textiles sector which has the adjusted weight of 36.6 per cent in the entire LSM sector, showed a negative growth of 9.6 per cent during the six months. The growth was minus two per cent in the same period last year.

However, textiles succeeded to fetch much better prices in the international market which helped the country register 20 per cent growth in overall exports in the first seven months of the current fiscal year.

The second largest sector in terms of weight in LSM is food and beverages which also showed a negative growth of 6.8 per cent compared to negative growth of 5.8 per cent in the six months of last year.

Petroleum products, having an adjusted weight of 6.96 per cent, saw a decline of minus 8.3 per cent against pervious minus 6.1 per cent during the same period.

Automobile sector had been a thriving sector for economy but its growth also fell.

During this period, auto sector grew by 16.5 per cent compared to 47.2 per cent during the six months of last year.

The main impact in auto sector, having an adjusted weight of 6.2 per cent, witnessed a low growth of motorcycles which reduced to just 17.6 per cent as compared to 54 per cent growth during the corresponding period of last year.

Tyres and tubes growth also went down by minus 13.5 per cent compared to a positive growth of 29.7 per cent during the same period of last year.

Cement sector noted a negative growth of minus 10 per cent compared to positive growth of 16.2 per cent.

The overall picture appeared from the LSM growth and reflects a poor economic performance in the first half of the current fiscal year.

The manufactures were of the view that cost of production has gone up by many-fold.

Increasing fuel and power prices, regular load-shedding of electricity in industrial areas of the country while gas load-shedding crippled the industry during the winter, they said.