Northern Ireland service sector output 'recovering strongly'

The strongest subsectors in services were in business and finance, which saw quarterly growth of 3.6% and annual growth of 17%

The NI service sector continued to recover strongly in the final quarter of 2021, official figures suggest.

From October to December, output grew by 1.3% compared to the previous quarter and by 9.2% compared with the same time in 2020.

That was despite a weak performance by the retail sector, which may have been hit by the impact of Omicron.

Retail output was down by 1.1% compared to the previous quarter and by 2.9% on an annual basis.

It is the first time the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (Nisra) has produced specific retail figures.

The experimental data is drawn from a sample of about 360 businesses, covering all retailers with 100 or more employees and those employing up to 99 people with a turnover of £10m or more, along with a representative sample of smaller firms.

The figures suggest that retail sales at the end of 2021 remained 4.4% below the pre-pandemic level seen at the end of 2019.

The strongest subsectors in services were in business and finance, which saw quarterly growth of 3.6% and annual growth of 17%.

Transport equipment troubles

That partially reflects the strength of the housing market, which saw the highest number of sales since 2006, and will have boosted business services like law and estate agency.

Meanwhile, it was a mixed picture for the Northern Ireland production sector, which is mostly manufacturing.

Overall, output was up by 1.1% over the quarter and it increased by 2.2% over the year.

That includes sectors such as power generation and recycling, but when manufacturing is looked at on its own, growth was essentially flat - output was up 0.2% on the quarter, but down 0.5% in the year.

There are likely to be pandemic-related factors in the performance.

Output for pharma and textile, which spiked close to an all-time high in the final quarter of 2020, probably due to high demand for test kits and personal protective equipment (PPE), was lower during the same period in 2021.

The pandemic-related slowdown in demand for aerospace equipment is also a factor - output in the broad transport equipment sector was still 40% below pre-pandemic levels.