2012 began on something of a hopeful note. Many believed that the spending cuts imposed by the Coalition government, while harsh, were having the desired affect and helping the country's economy back to growth.
But as last month's data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) confirmed, the economy has not yet shown signs of having benefited from the austerity measures as the country slipped into a double-dip recession, with GDP declining by 0.2 per cent during the first three months of the year.
Now, further data has been released demonstrating a number of issues particular to the manufacturing sector. Individuals and companies considering buying a manufacturing business might benefit from keeping an eye on developments in this area as there are both positive and negative sides to the latest update.
Output, for example, rose by a strong-than-expected 0.9 per cent in March, following a fall of 1.1 per cent in February. However, the wider measure of industrial production fell by 0.3 per cent due to a drop in oil and gas production.
The positive signs of recovery, meanwhile, were predominantly driven by chemicals, transport equipment, electronics and computer businesses, according to the ONS data.
Philip Shaw from Investec spoke to the BBC about the figures: "It's encouraging to see that manufacturing almost recovered its February loses in March, although taken over Q1 [the first quarter] as a whole, the sector remains flat.
"The outlook for manufacturing has been clouded by differing messages from varying surveys. So for example the CBI quarterly survey was punchy but the most recent PMI [purchasing managers' index] figures suggest the sector is doing barely anything." 
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