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By Crispian Balmer
PARIS, April 8 (Reuters) - France's trade deficit widened in February, with imports and exports both sharply down on the year, indicating the depth of the economic slowdown, figures released on Wednesday showed.
The French customs house said the deficit in the euro zone's second biggest economy was 4.1 billion euros ($5.41 billion) in seasonally-adjusted terms in February, compared with a downwardly revised 3.7 billion euro gap the previous month.
Exports totalled 28.86 billion euros and imports were 32.97 billion euros. In the same month last year, exports were some 36.5 billion euros and imports 39.4 billion.
"On the face of it the French data is not that catastrophic with a monthly deficit of about 4 billion euros, which is much lower than what we saw in the final months of 2008," said Alexander Law, an analyst at Paris researchers Xerfi.
"However, the improvement is recession-driven. We're importing less because we're spending less and companies are investing less," he added.
In separate data, the Bank of France in its latest survey revised down its forecast for the economy in the first quarter, predicting growth would decline 0.8 percent in the period against a previous forecast of a 0.6 percent contraction.
Many independent analysts are predicting that growth will decline by at least one percentage point in the first quarter.
The central bank said industrial production declined in all sectors in March, falling at a similar pace to February, while capacity utilisation rates dropped to a record low.
"What we're seeing in France is the same as everywhere: we're no longer in freefall as we were in late 2008 and early 2009 but nor is there a real improvement, let alone a rebound," said Jean-Louis Mourier, analyst with trading house Aurel BGC.
EXPORTS DROP SHARPLY ON MONTH
The February trade deficit was broadly in line with analyst predictions and showed exports falling some 431 million euros on January levels, while imports dipped just 38 million euros.
Reflecting the sharp fall in the price of oil over the past year, France's deficit in energy products was 2.77 billion euros in February against 4.57 billion euros 12 months ago.
The industrial manufacturing sector registered a 2.76 billion euro deficit in February compared with a 3.34 billion euro shortfall in January.
Sales of Airbus planes rose to 24 planes for a value of 1.24 billion euros against 19 planes, worth 857 million, in January.
The overall January deficit figure was sharply revised down to 3.71 billion euros against a previously given 4.55 billion.
France's biggest trade deficit remained with China, at 1.8 billion euros, down on a 1.96 billion deficit in January.
By contrast, France's biggest trade surplus, of 446 million euros, was with Britain.
France registered a record 55.7 billion euro trade deficit in 2008, hurt by high oil prices early in the year. This year's deficit is expected to be lower.
"Overall, the trade haemorrhage has stopped," said Xerfi's Law. "We're at the lowest ebb now. The good news is that as of the second or third quarter the only possible way is up." For full table on the data double click on [[ID:nL8610963]] For more analyst comment double click on [[ID:nL8397684]] (Additional reporting by Estelle Shirbon, Sophie Hardach and Vicky Buffery) (Editing by Andy Bruce)