South Korea’s industrial output fell for a third consecutive month in January, a government report showed Wednesday.

Output declined 1.2 percent from a month earlier, but moved up 1.8 percent from the same month in 2015, according to Statistics Korea. 

Production in the mining, manufacturing, gas and electricity industries dropped 1.9 percent last month from a year earlier. Communications equipment production tumbled 24.5 percent from a year earlier, while output in the electronic parts and machinery sectors fell 11.2 percent and 1.9 percent on-year, respectively.

Production in the automobile industry also fell 3.1 percent from a year earlier.

Meanwhile, the semiconductor sector’s output jumped 15.8 percent and that of oil refiners gained 4.9 percent from the previous year.

Production in services expanded 3 percent from a year before, but it backtracked 0.9 percent on-month from December, the report showed.

Asia’s fourth-largest economy posted an 18.8 percent on-year decline in its outbound shipments in January amid waning global demand and low oil prices.

(khnews@heraldcorp.com)