Brazil industrial production down 4.7% over 12 months

Brazil's industrial production has dropped 4.7 percent over 12 months after slipping in March by 0.8 percent amid a sharp downturn in the world's seventh-largest economy, official figures showed Wednesday.

Brazil is enduring a fifth straight year of low growth -- last year saw GDP grow by just 0.1 percent and this year is set to see a contraction of around 1.0 percent, the Central Bank and International Monetary Fund agree.

The seasonally-adjusted decline for the first quarter of the year was 5.9 percent.

"With the March 2015 result, industrial production is 11.2 percent below the record level reached in June 2013," the national statistical institute IBGE said.

February saw industry contract 1.3 percent -- revised from an initial fall of 0.9 percent -- with vehicle production sliding 4.7 percent while machinery was down 3.8 percent and capital goods by 4.4 percent.

Durables slid 3.1 percent and consumer goods 1.1 percent, the figures showed in fresh negative data for a government already rocked by rising inflation, joblessness and interest rates as well as a huge graft scandal at state oil firm Petrobras.

The local currency, the real, has also plunged, losing around a fifth of its value against the dollar this year.

National statistical institute IBGE figures for February had shown a 9.1 percent output drop over the same month in 2014 for the biggest inter-annual fall in six years.

The institute indicated all major sectors of the economy had seen a drop in production.

The industrial production index has been negative for 13 straight months -- -3.5 percent in March, compared with forecasts of -3.0 percent, albeit better than February's slump with that month's showing partially influenced by having fewer working days.

President Dilma Rousseff's leftist government has embarked on a course of modest austerity in an attempt to refloat the economy but has struggled to obtain the support of several allies in its governing coalition.