Overseas demand for meat and dairy products buoyed up an otherwise flat-lining New Zealand manufacturing sector in the quarter to the end of September, the government statistics agency announced Monday.

The total value of New Zealand manufacturing sales rose by 1.6 percent, or 370 million NZ dollars (308.41 million U.S. dollars), driven by a rise of 9.3 percent, or 612 million NZ dollars, in sales of meat and dairy products, according to Statistics New Zealand.

The volume of manufacturing sales rose 2.6 percent, also led by meat and dairy product manufacturing, up 13 percent.

"The volume increase in meat and dairy manufacturing is reflected in the rise of export volumes for dairy and meat products, with increases of 32 percent in dairy and 15 percent in meat," industry and labor statistics manager Blair Cardno said in a statement.

"Looking at the longer-term picture, the trend for manufacturing volumes has risen in the past year."

Excluding the meat and dairy industry, the volume of manufacturing sales fell by 1.4 percent in the September quarter.

"Despite this, the trend for sales volume, excluding the meat and dairy industry, has remained relatively flat for the last three years," Cardno said.

Eight of the other 12 manufacturing industries recorded falls in the September quarter, with the biggest movements in metal product manufacturing, which was down 6.9 percent, and chemical, polymer and rubber product manufacturing up 7.3 percent.