People view mild installations for Christmas at Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay on Dec. 18, 2023. (Photo by Then Chih Wey/Xinhua through Getty Images)
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Singapore’s economy grew 2.8% year-on-year within the last quarter of 2023, based on advance estimates from the nation’s Ministry of Trade and Industry on Tuesday.
This was a pointy enhance from the 1% growth recorded within the third quarter, and the quickest charge of growth for the reason that third quarter of 2022.
On a quarter-on-quarter seasonally-adjusted foundation, the economic system grew 1.7%, a bigger growth than the 1.3% within the third quarter.
For the yr 2023, the economic system grew by 1.2%, a slower tempo from the three.6% growth in 2022. This was in line with the MTI’s expectations, which forecast the economic system to develop “round 1%” in November.
In his New Year’s message on Jan. 1, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said the nation “prevented a recession” in 2023. Lee described the yr as “difficult,” citing a “troubled” worldwide atmosphere, such because the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, in addition to tensions between the U.S. and China.
He added that regardless of this, “households are nonetheless feeling the stress of upper value of residing, although inflation is progressively coming down.”
Singapore narrowly prevented a technical recession in 2023 after recording a 0.1% quarter-on-quarter growth within the second quarter, following a 0.3% contraction within the first quarter. A technical recession is usually outlined as two straight quarters of GDP contraction.
Most notably, Singapore’s manufacturing sector, which includes about 20% of its economic system and the nation’s largest sector, expanded by 3.2% year-on-year within the fourth quarter, reversing from the 4.7% contraction within the earlier quarter.
The manufacturing sector had recorded consecutive year-on-year declines within the first three quarters of 2023, earlier than the turnaround within the last quarter.
The ministry mentioned “growth within the sector was because of output expansions throughout all clusters, with the exception of the precision engineering cluster.”
In November, MTI forecast that Singapore’s GDP will see an expansion of about 1% to 3% in 2024, including that main international economies just like the U.S. will possible gradual within the first half of the yr, earlier than selecting up progressively within the second half of the yr.