The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) yesterday revised upward its estimate for this year’s GDP growth to 6.14 percent from its February forecast of 4.72 percent.
First-quarter GDP rose 13.27 percent from a year earlier, posting the highest growth since the fourth quarter of 1978, up from the 9.24 percent estimated in February, the statistics agency said.
DGBAS officials attributed the better-than-expected economic growth in the first quarter to a strong rebound in exports and private investment, in addition to the low comparison base last year.
“The economy has returned to pre-economic crisis levels,” agency chief Shih Su-mei (石素梅) told a media briefing, adding that the economy has posted growth for a second straight quarter for the first time since the financial crisis broke in 2008.
Thanks to strong economic growth in China and other emerging nations in Asia that have led the global recovery, exports rose 43.74 percent from a year earlier in the first quarter, Shih said.
Detailed statistics showed that major contributions to the 13.27 percent growth came from net exports, which made up 1.96 percentage points, and private sector investment, which accounted for 4.23 percentage points.
The agency forecast that GDP would increase 7.66 percent from a year earlier in the second quarter, 4.4 percent in the third quarter and 0.69 percent in the fourth quarter.
On a yearly basis, an estimate of 6.14 percent growth is second only to the 6.19 percent recorded in 2004 and exports are expected to increase 24.47 percent this year — the highest growth since 1988.
Private investment would likely grow by 18.38 percent this year as high-tech industries have stepped up their purchases of equipment because of the bullish economic outlook, while public investment is expected to top NT$500 billion (US$15.5 billion), representing an increase of 1.85 percent.
DGBAS expected consumer prices to rise 1.4 percent from a year earlier this year, with the wholesale price index growing nearly 6 percent as soaring international raw material prices have started to affect downstream products.
Economists were not as optimistic as government officials, however, saying economic growth in the second half of the year would be far less than in the first half.
“Although GDP is expected to grow by more than 10 percent in the first half of this year, the second half will see growth of less than 3 percent year-on-year,” Citigroup chief economist Cheng Cheng-mount (鄭貞茂) said by telephone.
“The momentum of economic growth will gradually decrease throughout the year,” Cheng said, noting that the discrepancy between economic growth in the first half and in the second half indicated uncertainty about the future.
Yang Chia-yen (楊家彥), director at the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (台灣經濟研究院), agreed, saying that the eurozone debt crisis would affect the nation’s export-driven economy.
“As Taiwan’s economy relies heavily on exports, worse-than-expected economic recovery in the EU market and the possibility of an appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar in the second half will likely slow Taiwan’s economic growth,” Yang said by telephone.
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