S'pore economy grows by 4.9% in 2011

SINGAPORE: The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) announced on Thursday that the Singapore economy had grown by 4.9 per cent in 2011, after a 14.8 per cent expansion in 2010.

MTI also maintained the growth forecast for 2012 at 1.0 to 3.0 per cent.

The GDP numbers released Thursday have experts and officials agreeing that a recession for Singapore appears less than likely.

"Trade numbers give some hope that we will not slip into recession" said MTI director Thia Jang Ping.

Singapore's real GDP grew by 3.6 per cent on a year-on-year basis in Q4 2011, compared to the 6.0 per cent in Q3.

On a quarter-on-quarter seasonally-adjusted annualised basis, the economy contracted by 2.5 per cent, reversing the 2.0 per cent growth in the previous quarter.

On a year-on-year basis, the manufacturing sector grew by 9.2 per cent, slower than the 13.7 per cent growth in Q3.

On a sequential basis, the manufacturing sector contracted by 11.1 per cent, compared to a 11.0 per cent increase in the previous quarter. This was due to a decline across most manufacturing clusters.

The construction sector grew by 2.9 per cent on a year-on-year basis, a slight improvement from the 2.4 per cent growth in the preceding quarter. On a sequential basis, the sector contracted by 2.2 per cent (annualised) largely due to a decline in private residential and commercial building activities.

The wholesale & retail trade and transportation & storage sectors registered relatively weak growth of 0.9 and 2.4 per cent respectively on a year-on-year basis.

On a sequential basis, the wholesale & retail trade sector expanded by an annualised pace of 10.2 per cent, reflecting a pick-up in re-export activities. By contrast, the transportation & storage sector contracted by 2.9 per cent.

Growth in the finance & insurance and business services sectors were modest, at 3.5 and 1.9 per cent respectively on a year-on-year basis.

On a sequential basis, the finance & insurance sector declined by 4.4 per cent (annualised), dragged down by poor performance in the sentiment-sensitive segments such as fund management and stock broking.

Growth momentum in the business services sector picked up slightly to 2.4 per cent.