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Tue 06 Jun 2007Manufacturing slows in AprilDriven by rapidly-slowing output from multinational firms, overall manufacturing output growth fell in April. Output remains above the rate recorded for last year, but was sharply lower compared to the previous month, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) said yesterday.Due to strong growth in December and January, the latest index of industrial production in April was 6.2 per cent higher than April 2006. Compared with growth of 13.4 per cent in March and 24.8 per cent in February, however, the latest figure suggests rapidly-slowing growth.