Russian industrial production rose at the slowest annual pace this year in August, the Federal Statistics Service said.

Output increased 3.8 percent in August, compared with 7.8 percent in the previous month and after expanding at the fastest rate in 2 1/2 years in June, the Moscow-based statistics office said in an e-mailed statement today, without saying why. In the month, output fell 1.8 percent after falling 2.7 percent in the previous month.

Russia, the world's biggest exporter of crude oil and natural gas, aims to boost manufacturing and high-tech industry to become less dependent on revenue from energy sales. The government seeks to double the size of Russia's $1 trillion economy, the world's 10th biggest, by 2020.

Production of grain-harvesting combines and radios contracted in August, while output of construction cranes and pipeline parts increased compared with the year-earlier period.

Manufacturing expanded an annual 5.5 percent, down from 12.5 percent in the previous month.

Electricity, gas and water output decreased to an annual 2.2 percent, compared with 3.3 percent in July. Mining and quarrying grew 0.5 percent in August, slower than the 1.2 percent pace of the previous month.

Output expanded an annual 7 percent in the first eight months of the year. The median estimate of 12 economists surveyed by Bloomberg was for 6.7 percent.