Index of Production, UK: August 2023

• Monthly production output is estimated to have fallen 0.7% in August 2023; this follows a revised fall of 1.1% (revised down from a fall of 0.7%) in July 2023.

• The monthly decrease in output in August 2023 resulted from a decline in three of the four production sectors, with ”manufacturing” being the main contributor to the monthly fall (0.8%) with other smaller contributing decreases in “water supply and sewerage” (1.6%) and “electricity and gas” (1.8%); this was partially offset by a rise in “mining and quarrying” (2.9%).

• Monthly manufacturing output decreased by 0.8% with decreases in 9 of its 13 subsectors during August 2023; most notably, “other manufacture and repair” and “manufacture of computer, electronic and optical products” fell 3.4% and 3.2%, respectively.

• Looking at the longer-term profile, production output for the three months to August 2023 rose by 1.2% compared with the three months to May 2023; this was because of a large monthly growth in June (2.5%), following a fall in May (0.5%), which in turn was partly caused by the loss of a working day for the additional Bank Holiday for the Coronation of King Charles III.

• This release gives data for August 2023 for the first time. In line with the National Accounts revision policy, this release also incorporates revisions to monthly data from January 1997 to June 2023, as published in our Quarterly national accounts bulletin on 29 September 2023. July 2023 is also open to revision for the first time.

• Further analysis of the effect on our monthly Index of Production estimate is available in our Gross domestic product (GDP) monthly estimate, UK: August 2023 bulletin, published 12 October 2023.

The Index of Production (IoP) uses data from a variety of sources. It is calculated by taking turnover and removing the impact of price changes, or by using direct volume estimates.

Most of these data are collected as “turnover values” through the Monthly Business Survey (MBS). In addition, direct volume series are collected by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), and the International Steel Statistics Bureau (ISSB) for steel industries.

The Office for National Statistics’ (ONS) MBS is fully online. Business owners can log on from any location and submit their data at an appropriate time. Most other data in the IoP come from the DESNZ, and therefore will be less affected than the survey data.

From January 2018, Value Added Tax (VAT) data have also been included across 64 production industries for small and medium-sized businesses. For more information, see our VAT turnover data in National Accounts: background and methodology article.

A comprehensive list of the IoP source data can be found in our Gross domestic product (GDP) data sources catalogue (XLS, 1.9MB).

More quality and methodology information on strengths, limitations, appropriate uses, and how the data were created is available in our UK Index of Production Quality and Methodology Information (QMI).

Additional bank holiday in May 2023 for the Coronation of King Charles III

There was an additional bank holiday for the coronation of King Charles III on Monday 8 May 2023. While adjustments are made for regular calendar effects, there was no explicit adjustment for this event. However, the timing of the bank holiday indirectly affects the number of trading days, which could affect GDP estimates positively or negatively, depending on the sector. This should be taken into account when interpreting monthly, and three-monthly movements over recent months since May 2023.

Revisions to IoP

In line with the National Accounts revision policy, this release gives data for August 2023 for the first time with revisions open for all other periods.

These revisions are consistent with the quarterly national accounts release that was published on 29 September 2023, and incorporates improved source data, updated seasonal adjustment parameters, and additional updated data as would happen in all quarterly national accounts releases. This includes new Value Added Tax (VAT) turnover data for Quarter 4 (Oct to Dec) 2022 and Quarter 1 (Jan to Mar) 2023.

For further information on the updates to monthly GDP methods and data sources in Blue Book 2023, please see Section 10: Measuring the data in the Gross domestic product (GDP) monthly estimate, UK: August 2023 bulletin.

Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) review of GDP

The OSR completed a review of the practices around the preparation and release of information about revisions to estimates of GDP in our Impact of Blue Book 2023 article released on 01 September 2023. This will cover the processes and quality assurance in making revisions to GDP and the potential improvements to early estimates of GDP enabled through enhanced access to data. It will also cover the communication of:

• revisions to GDP

• the story behind the most recent set of revisions in particular

• uncertainty in early estimates of GDP