MEXICO CITY, Sept 1 (Reuters) - Mexico’s factories fell further into contraction territory in August, after showing tentative signs of a recovery the prior month, extending a current 18 month string of contractions, a survey showed on Wednesday. The IHS Markit Mexico Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index slipped to 47.1 in August from 49.6 in July, below the 50 threshold that separates growth from contraction. The index has remained below that threshold every month since March 2020 and plummeted to 35.0 in April 2020 amid the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, in what was by far the lowest reading in the survey’s 10-year history. “Domestic and international demand for Mexican-manufactured goods remained weak in August, further delaying any recovery. This shortage of new work coupled with a lack of backlogs continued to restrict production and prevent job creation,” said Pollyanna De Lima, economics associate director at IHS Markit. With growing concerns about new coronavirus outbreaks, business confidence weakened to a four-month low as sales and output last expanded in February 2020, the survey showed. The survey also underscored a quicker contraction in new work intakes that resulted in sharper declines in production, employment, input buying and stocks and supply-chain constraints that continued to exert upward pressure on input prices. “However, Mexican manufacturers refrained from passing higher costs on to clients and lowered their charges to support demand,” said De Lima. Mexico’s economy grew 1.5% in the second quarter from the previous three-month period and in annual terms expanded 19.6% compared to a year earlier, data from the national statistics agency showed. (Reporting by Anthony Esposito, Editing by Chizu Nomiyama) Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.