Ireland’s service sector saw robust growth last month, which combined with an improvement in manufacturing gave the country’s private sector a big boost, according to survey results from S&P Global on Tuesday.
The AIB services purchasing managers’ index rose strongly to 54.4 points in February from a near-neutral reading of 50.5 in January. This helped lift the composite PMI for Ireland to 54.4 points from 50.7. Issued on Friday last week, the manufacturing PMI rose to 52.2 points last month from 49.5 in January. The composite PMI is a combination of the services and factory scores.
‘Irish [service sector] firms continued to report rising levels of new business across all sectors, and this was linked in part to robust international demand. The volume of outstanding work also increased on the month, following a dip in activity in January,’ said AIB Chief Economist David McNamara.
The 12-month outlook for total service sector activity was its strongest since February last year, according to survey respondents. The only negative reported was a rise input prices.
The services PMI is calculated by S&P Global based on responses to a questionnaire sent to 400 service providers in Ireland. The responses are collected in the second half of each month.
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