With this development, China unseats Japan and is trailing behind the United States.

According to UNIDO estimates, the share of China in world total of manufacturing value added (MVA) at constant 2000 US$ has reached 15.6 per cent in 2009, compared to 15.4 per cent of Japan, while the USA maintains its first rank with 19 per cent. These three countries combined produce half of the world manufacturing output.

The conclusion is made from the data published in UNIDO’s International Yearbook of Industrial Statistics 2010, which is the only international publication providing economists, planners, policymakers and business people with worldwide statistics on current performance and trends in the manufacturing sector.

Despite the lead of China in absolute amount of production, the report suggests that Japan is still the most industrialized country of the world in terms of MVA per capita. Japan’s MVA per capita for 2008 was almost 9000 US$ compared to about 700$ of China.

The report also suggests that the effect of the recent financial crisis on industrial growth was severe for industrialized countries, but relatively mild for developing countries. Out of the top 10 countries in manufacturing production, two more countries from the developing world, namely India and Brazil, ranked ninth and tenth.

The Yearbook of Industrial Statistics 2010 also provides internationally comparable data for major indicators of manufacturing activity. The data can be used to analyze patterns of growth and related long term trends, structural change and industrial performance in individual industries.

The publication presents recent data from national industrial surveys for more than 70 countries in detail. UNIDO maintains international industrial statistics database and disseminates its statistical products to the wide range of international data users.

Source : ONU