Press release No. 165 of 8 May 2025
Production in industry
March 2025 (in real terms, provisional):
+3.0% on the previous month (seasonally and calendar adjusted)
-0.2% on the same month a year earlier (calendar adjusted)
February 2025 (in real terms, revised):
-1.3% on the previous month (seasonally and calendar adjusted)
-4.1% on the same month a year earlier (calendar adjusted)
WIESBADEN – Production in industry in real terms (price adjusted) was up 3.0% in March 2025 month on month after seasonal and calendar adjustment, according to provisional data provided by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). The less volatile three-month on three-month comparison also showed that production was 1.4% higher in the 1st quarter of 2025 than in the 4th quarter of 2024. Based on this comparison, production registered the most significant increase since the beginning of 2022. The provisional result for February 2025 was confirmed (-1.3% on January 2025). Compared with March 2024, production was 0.2% lower in March 2025 after adjustment for calendar effects.
Production growth in many economic branches
Numerous economic branches contributed to the positive development in industry in March 2025. In particular, the production increases in the automotive industry (+8.1%), the pharmaceutical industry (+19.6%) and the manufacture of machinery and equipment (+4.4%) had an impact on overall performance.
In March 2025, production in industry excluding energy and construction was up 3.6% from February 2025 after seasonal and calendar adjustment. Within industry, increases were reported in all three major groups. The production of consumer goods and capital goods each rose by 4.9% and that of intermediate goods by 1.1%. Outside industry, energy production dropped by 1.8% in March 2025 compared with the previous month. Production in construction rose by 2.1%.
Compared with March 2024, production in industry excluding energy and construction in March 2025 increased by 0.3% on a calendar adjusted basis.
Production up in energy-intensive industrial branches
Production in energy-intensive industrial branches increased by 1.5% in March 2025 from February 2025, after adjustment for seasonal and calendar effects. A three-month on three-month comparison showed that production in the energy-intensive industrial branches was 1.2% higher in the period from January to March 2025 than in the previous three months. Adjusted for calendar effects, production in energy-intensive industrial branches was down 2.3% in March 2025 compared with March 2024. An analysis on the Production index for energy-intensive industrial branches (only in German) is available on the "Industry, manufacturing" page of the Federal Statistical Office’s website.
Methodological notes:
The differing comparative periods must be taken into account in all press releases on short-term indicators. Short-term economic monitoring focuses on comparisons of seasonally and calendar adjusted figures with those of the previous month or quarter. These reflect short-term economic trends. Year-on-year comparisons of calendar adjusted results enable long-term comparisons of levels and are not influenced by seasonal fluctuations or calendar effects.
The rates of change are based on the production index for industry. The average figure for 2021 is used as the basis of the index and set to 100 index points (2021 = 100). The X13 JDemetra+ method was used for calendar and seasonal adjustment.
The five branches referred to here as “energy-intensive” have particularly high energy demands in relation to their gross value added. In the reference year of 2021, they collectively accounted for 77% of total industrial energy consumption. Their proportion of industrial gross value added stood at 17%. In 2021, just under one million people (929,599) were employed in the 6,986 industrial establishments of these branches in Germany.
For better readability, this press release uses a short form for the names of some economic branches which differs from the designations in the "Classification of Economic Activities (2008 edition)". An overview of these short forms (only in German) is provided on the "Industry, manufacturing" page on the website of the Federal Statistical Office.
More information:
Basic data and long time series on the production index in industry can be found in the table Indices of production in manufacturing (42153-0001) in the GENESIS-Online database. It contains the time series of the production index for energy-intensive industrial branches from 2005 onwards.
A dossier on the "Short-term indicators" page of the Federal Statistical Office's website provides an analysis of the relationship between material shortages, new orders, production and prices in industry. Detailed information on production in energy-intensive industrial branches (only in German) is available on the "Industry, manufacturing" page.
The production index can also be found on the Economic Dashboard, which is part of Dashboard Germany (www.dashboard-deutschland.de) (only in German). In this data portal, the Federal Statistical Office brings together up-to-date indicators from official statistics producers and other data providers on the topics of the economy, finance, the labour market, construction, housing, energy and Ukraine. The portal also contains the Economic Pulse Monitor tool (Pulsmesser für die Wirtschaft) (only in German) for real-time economic monitoring.
