Economists raised their growth forecasts for Singapore's economy on Friday after manufacturing output in February surged 38.3 percent in its fastest expansion in three years to beat market predictions.
The growth, the ninth straight month of expansion, was sharply faster than the revised 4.7 percent rise in January, the government's Economic Development Board (EDB) said.
In the January to February period, manufacturing output was up 19.2 percent from the previous year.
"Major contributors to February's growth were the bio-medical manufacturing, electronics and precision engineering clusters. Manufacturing output excluding bio-medical manufacturing increased by 29.7 percent," the EDB said.
It said the higher output was due partly to more work days in February this year compared with February last year.
Economists said they would upgrade their GDP growth forecasts for the March quarter and the full-year after the latest numbers.
Song Seng Wun, a regional economist with GK Goh brokerage, was the most optimistic, saying GDP should grow 7.0 to 7.1 percent in the three months to March.
He said full-year GDP should expand 7.0 percent, a rate significantly higher than the government's official forecast of 3.5 to 5.5 percent.
RSS