After falling 13.2% in February, Russian industrial production is forecast to plunge 7.4% in 2009, the government said on March 18.
Metal production, building materials and machinery would be hardest hit.
Industrial output grew by a sluggish 2.1% in 2008, slowing sharply from 6.3% the previous year, according to the federal statistics agency Rosstat.
In January this year it fell by a massive 16% compared to the same month a year ago, the sharpest decline in 15 years.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2009
