Manufacturing sales in Canada edged up 0.1 per cent to $49.9 billion in May, while constant dollar sales fell 0.5 per cent, indicating a lower volume of goods sold, said Statistics Canada Wednesday.
The slight increase in current dollar sales was the second gain in 2015. Sales were up in 6 out of 21 industries, representing almost half of the Canadian manufacturing sector.).
The gain in May partly reflects changes in the value of the US dollar relative to the Canadian dollar. Year to date, production has increased 7.4 per cent compared with the same period in 2014.
Sales of petroleum and coal products rose 5.6 per cent, mostly reflecting higher prices as reported by the Industrial Product Price Index. Prices fell from June 2014 to January 2015 for petroleum refineries, reaching a low in January. In May, prices were 14 per cent higher than in January.
Other industries posting lower sales included food and wood manufacturers.