Industrial production soars
Industrial production soars
In accordance with data published by Statistics Poland (GUS), the volume of sold production in enterprises employing more than 9 people went up by 9.4% YoY in March compared with a 1.3% growth in February, coming in markedly above our forecast (4.0%) and market consensus (4.1%). Year-on-year industrial production growth between February and March was substantially boosted by the easing of adverse weather conditions that had been seen in January and February. Activity in the industry was further supported by the statistical effect of a favourable difference in the number of business days (one day more in March 2026 vs. March 2025, with the same number of working days in February 2025 and 2026). Seasonally-adjusted industrial production went up by 7.0% MoM in March. Consequently, industrial production in March reached an all-time high.
Broad-based recovery in the industry
Industrial production growth accelerated in all three main segments of the industry, i.e. export-oriented branches (6.6% YoY vs. -0.9% YoY in February), construction-related sectors (5.6% YoY vs. -6.2%) and non-export-oriented sectors unrelated to construction (11.7% vs. 4.2%). Based on the data released today, it is difficult to assess, though, whether activity in Polish manufacturing in March was adversely affected by the conflict in the Middle East and weaker sentiment in the manufacturing sector of the Eurozone and Germany. The strong improvement in weather conditions has masked the negative impact of those factors, if there was any. Nonetheless, it is worth noting the continued year-on-year increase, observed since March 2025 in capital goods production, which accelerated substantially in March 2026 (to 9.4% YoY vs. 3.9% in February).
Construction sector makes up for losses, but only partially
Construction and assembly production went up by 0.4% YoY in March, after a 13.7% drop in February, coming in above the market consensus (-1.8% YoY) and our forecast (-4.0%). As in the case of industrial production, construction and assembly production also grew strongly in March thanks to better weather conditions and the statistical effect of a favourable difference in the number of business days. Construction and assembly production growth accelerated in all three main categories: “specialised construction activities” (0.2% YoY in March vs. -12.2% in February), “civil engineering works” (-0.2% vs. -11.6%) and the “construction of buildings” (1.4% vs. -16.8%) categories. In March, seasonally-adjusted construction and assembly production expanded by 6.2% MoM. Consequently, in March, activity in the construction sector remained 7.8% lower than in December 2025, which means that the sector has not fully recovered yet after the strong declines caused by the freezing winter in January (-9.8% MoM) and February (-3.8% MoM) despite the significant rebound. We anticipate that construction and assembly production will stay on the upward trajectory in April, supported by the growing absorption of EU funds, which will peak in 2026. The abovementioned scenario is underpinned by the March results of the survey of construction sector companies done by Statistics Poland to analyse their expectations for the volume of the domestic orders portfolio, which rose to reach the highest level since February 2024.
Wage growth accelerates while employment keeps falling
In accordance with the GUS data published today, the employment growth rate for the enterprise sector edged down from -0.8% YoY in February to -0.9% in March, coming in below the market consensus and our forecast (-0.8%). In monthly terms, the number of employed in March fell by 9.1k, so the scale of decline was similar to that reported in 2023-2025. The result is consistent with our conclusion saying that the annual employment drop seen in the enterprise sector since Q4 2023 is largely connected with employees attaining retirement age. Nominal wage growth in enterprises employing more than 9 people went up from 6.1% YoY in February to 6.6% in March, coming in above market consensus (6.3%) and our forecast (6.5%). The strongest upward impact on wage growth in March was exerted by a stronger growth in wages in the mining sector (6.7% YoY vs. -2.7% YoY in February), which is subject to a substantial impact of variable remuneration component fluctuations. This factor added 0.2 pp. to the annual wage growth rate compared with February. Due to the sharp increase in inflation (see MACROpulse of 15/04/2026), real wage growth rate fell from 3.9% YoY in February to 3.5% in March. Consequently, real wage fund growth rate fell from 3.0% YoY in February to 2.6% in March and, in quarterly terms, from 4.0% YoY in Q4 2025 to 2.9% in Q1 2026. This, however, doe not change our forecast of private consumption growth slowdown to 3.8% in Q1 2026, from 4.3% in Q4 2025.
The conflict in the Middle East remains the main risk to the GDP growth trajectory
Today’s data on industrial production, construction and assembly production, and wages and employment in the enterprise sector in March combined with the data on economic activity in January and February carry a substantial upside risk to our economic growth forecast for Q1 (3.5% YoY vs. 4.1% in Q4). At the same time, further developments of the conflict in the Middle East pose a downside risk to the GDP growth trajectory in the quarters to come, therefore we maintain our average annual GDP growth forecast for 2026 at 3.3%. In the next MACROmap, we will discuss the outlook for economic growth in greater detail, taking into account in particular the trends in the construction sector.
We believe that the overall tone of today’s data from Polish economy is slightly positive for the PLN and the yields on Polish bond yields.