Hungarian manufacturing companies received 21.5% more orders in March than in the same month a year earlier; new export orders rose 23.3% and new domestic orders rose 10.9% in the period, the Central Statistical Office (KSH) said on Friday.

The increase slowed from the first two months.

After steady declines between August 2008 and late 2009, new orders started to rise — mostly at double-digit rates — in a year-on-year comparison from February 2010, and the growth rates exceeded 25% in the first two months.

Similar to the previous month, branches seeing the sharpest rises in new domestic orders from a year earlier were drug makers (an increase of 53.1%), computer, electronics and optical product makers (45.8%) and machinery and equipment makers (38.6%). New orders of vehicle makers stayed, in contrast, below year earlier levels, and were down 7.1% yr/yr in March. New orders were down after rises in February in the clothing and paper segments, and were hardly changed yr/yr in chemicals production.

Among new export orders, the biggest year-on-year increase, of almost 106%, was registered by machinery and equipment in March, who has seen steep rises in export contracts since October 2009. Pharmaceuticals companies came second as the twelve-month rise of their export orders slowed to 82.6% from 100% in February and almost 150% in January. Computer, electronics and optical product makers ranked third with a yr/yr rise of almost 25%; their new export orders has risen steeply since the beginning of 2010. The rise of the new export orders of vehicle manufacturers slowed to 8.2% from mostly double-digit increases since the autumn of 2009. New export orders for the chemicals industry started to rise yr/yr also in autumn 2009, and their increase slowed to 1.8% in March.

Total stock of manufacturing sector orders was up 26% at the end of March from twelve months earlier. The stock rose, and at an increasing pace, now for the fourth month after steady declines since October 2008. The stock of export orders was almost 30% yr/yr while domestic orders still lagged 1.1% behind levels a year earlier.

Domestic order stock dipped under levels a year earlier in April 2009 and have been in the negative since. The decline in March, however, was the smallest during the period.

With the exception of last August and October, total stock of export orders has been up year-on-year since July 2010, following consecutive declines between November 2008 and June 2010.