* Output data worst in 6 months as strikes bite
* Outlook bleak, will weigh on growth
* Interest rates expected to stay on hold
(Adds mining data, quotes, background)
By Xola Potelwa
JOHANNESBURG, Nov 8 (Reuters) – South African factory output
shrank in September, its worst performance in six months,
painting a bleak picture for Africa’s biggest economy after a
wave of strikes that began in the mines.
Factory output contracted 1.1 percent year-on-year in
September, more than the 0.5 percent reduction analysts had
expected. It also compared to a 2.8 percent expansion in August.
“The industrial strikes have begun to take their toll on
domestic figures,” said Anisha Arora, emerging markets analyst
at 4Cast.
“Strike action rapidly spread from mining to manufacturing
and even the services sector well into October, closing plants
and operations for weeks and resulting in vast losses of
production volumes.”
A wave of wildcat strikes kicked off in the mining sector in
early August, and intensified after the Aug. 16 police killing
of 34 miners at Lonmin’s Marikana platinum mine, the bloodiest
security incident since the end of apartheid in 1994.
Continued…
