The Asian Development Bank (ADB) trimmed its economic growth forecast for Southeast Asia this year and next due to slower domestic demand in some of its bigger economies.
Its forecasts for China, the world’s second-largest economy, were unchanged.
The ADB on Thursday said Southeast Asia’s growth this year is now projected at 4.6 percent, down from an earlier forecast of 5 percent and actual growth of 5 percent last year.
Gross domestic product growth is expected to slow in Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, but pick up in Malaysia where exports have rebounded.
Next year, better performance of major industrial economies and Thailand’s recovery from its slump are forecast to spur Southeast Asian growth to 5.3 percent. The ADB’s earlier forecast was 5.4 percent.
The bank said 45 developing countries in Asia still comprise the world’s fastest-growing region and its stable growth masks shifting fortunes across sub-regions.
Growth forecasts for developing Asia as a whole were maintained at 6.2 percent this year and 6.4 percent next year, with upward adjustments in South Asia’s growth counterbalanced by likely slowdowns in Central Asia and Southeast Asia.
The region grew 6.1 percent last year.
China is still expected to grow 7.5 percent this year and 7.4 percent next year, as the bank projected in April.
“Slowing external demand has hurt some economies in the region but as a whole Asia and the Pacific is on track for firm growth in 2014 and 2015,” ADB chief economist Wei Shangjin (魏尚進) said.
The report said the world’s major industrial economies which recorded virtually no growth in the first half of the year now forecast to expand 1.5 percent collectively this year, slightly down from the ABD’s April forecast, before growth picks up to 2.1 percent next year.
India shows new promise of a turnaround with reforms expected to boost growth. The bank said it was maintaining its forecast of 5.5 percent growth for India this year, but is raising the forecast to 6.3 percent for next year from 6 percent.
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