Falling dairy prices hold down New Zealand manufacturing sales values

New Zealand manufacturers sold more by volume in the quarter to the end of December last year, but their sales values fell due to falling dairy prices, the government statistics agency said Monday.

The total manufacturing sales volume was up 0.9 percent in the December quarter, led by a 7.2-percent rise in petroleum and coal product manufacturing, with meat and dairy product manufacturing up by 0.9 percent, according to Statistics New Zealand.

"The volume of meat and dairy manufacturing sales was slightly up after recent falls, while manufacturing excluding meat and dairy continues to rise," business indicators manager Neil Kelly said in a statement.

The trend for the total manufacturing sales volume had been mainly rising since a low point in the June 2013 quarter.

However, the total value of manufacturing sales fell 0.7 percent, or 180 million NZ dollars (132.37 million U.S. dollars), with meat and dairy product manufacturing sales down 2.7 percent, or 207 million NZ dollars (152.22 million U.S. dollars), dragged down by falling dairy prices.

Total manufacturing sales volume was up 1.5 percent on the December 2013 quarter, while the total sales value was down 3.2 percent to 25.6 billion NZ dollars (18.8 billion U.S. dollars). Enditem