Greater Birmingham manufacturers are out-performing the rest of the UK on exports and home sales, a new survey is expected to show.
The latest quarterly economic survey from Birmingham Chamber of Commerce Group (BCCG) reveals that growth in overseas sales is significantly up on the previous quarter and above the UK average.
Birmingham is also out-performing the UK in domestic sales although growth has softened slightly. More manufacturers from the region are working at full capacity compared with the rest of the country.
As a result, Birmingham manufacturers are expected to be in the top of the sales league when the results of a British Chambers of Commerce survey are published at the beginning of October.
Chamber vice-president Steve Brittan, himself a machine tool manufacturer who succeeds president Michael Ward in November, said: “This does demonstrate the tremendous resilience of the manufacturing sector in Birmingham and surrounding areas.
“And we must not forget that manufacturing covers a multitude of disciplines in Birmingham from heavy engineering to making chocolate.
“The tremendous world-wide success of Jaguar Land Rover is also having an impact for suppliers.
“We have also benefited from a change of policy on oil in the United States. They are now exploring for new wells and extracting it rather than relying on foreign supplies which could often be unreliable.”
The Chamber survey showed that 45 per cent of manufacturers had increased sales during the third quarter compared with 38 per cent in June. Orders were up from 34 per cent to 36 per cent.
At home, 40 per cent increased sales compared with 41 per cent in the previous quarter and those reporting increased orders dropped only one per cent to 37.
A total of 59 per cent said they were confident that turnover would improve over the next 12 months compared with 58 per cent in the previous quarter and the number expecting profitability to improve was also up slightly
However, service industries in the city did not perform so well during the third quarter. Growth in exports and home sales fell slightly and confidence was on the slide. The number of firms certain that turnover would increase fell from 64 per cent to 31 per cent and only 32 per cent expected profitability to rise compared with 69 per cent.
