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Business news - September 2024

This month (September 2024) we have updates on the following topics:

  • General economic outlook
  • Conditions in the East Midlands
  • Skills in demand in our region
  • Challenges Ffaced by businesses
  • Labour markets

General outlook:

  • According to the BBC the general growth outlook for the UK was positive through Quarter 2, with the UK economy growing fastest of all nations within the G7 group. GDP figures showed that there had been a growth of 0.6% in Quarter 2 of 2024, following a growth of 0.7% in Quarter 1
  • With GDP figures for June 2024 becoming available, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said that while there was a positive overall growth trend, growth had slowed in June, with the economy remaining at the same size as the month before
  • While inflation increased slightly to 2.2% in July, which places it higher than the Bank of England’s 2% target, there was continued easing in the services sector. The BBC highlighted that this is important as it is one of the key areas that the Bank of England looks a when deciding whether to cut interest rates.

Conditions in the East Midlands

This month we have a focus on the conditions for businesses operating in the East Midlands looking at business activity and outlook moving forward.

  • The East Midlands region saw a decline in its business activity in July compared to June which ended a 7 month streak of expansion in activity. This fall in demand was linked to subdued client demand as well as drops in new orders. In addition, East Midlands businesses had the joint fastest decrease in activity alongside Wales
  • Despite this, firms still registered higher than average business optimism regarding outlook and output in the coming year. This optimism is the highest since February 2024 and was above the average of UK regions. This optimism was driven by hope that advertisement investment and new product would help to boost client demand and activity
  • More information on East Midlands business conditions as well as the other UK regions can be found on the NatWest Regional Growth Tracker.

Main challenges faced by businesses:

  1. Economic uncertainty
  2. Hiring of new staff
  3. Competition with other businesses
  4. Insufficient domestic demand

Skills most in demand in our region in June 2024 were:

  1. Auditing
  2. Warehousing
  3. Continuous improvement process
  4. Mental health
  5. Nursing

Labour markets:

Ashfield's July 2024 figures show that we have 4.3% or 3345 people of working age seeking work. This is much higher than in June 2024, which had 3150 people searching for work. While this figure is much higher than the East Midlands average of 3.9% it is the same as the UK average of 4.3%. More Economic data for Ashfield District can be found on the NOMIS website.

Last updated: 1- September 2024