Recession continues to hammer New Zealand’s economy, which shrank in the three months through March for a fifth consecutive quarter to record its biggest annual decline in activity in 17 years, new data showed yesterday.
Statistics New Zealand said GDP fell 1 percent in the March quarter, after a fall of 1 percent in the three months ended Dec. 31. GDP was also down 1 percent for the year ended March.
FIFTH STRAIGHT DECLINE
It’s the first time since the series began in 1986 that GDP has declined for five straight quarters.
The 1 percent declines of the December and March quarters were the largest since 1992, the government-funded statistics agency said.
Biggest contributors to the annual fall were an 8.9 percent drop in construction and a 5.4 percent fall in manufacturing, it said.
The main contributor to the March quarter fall was manufacturing, which dropped 7.2 percent.
SPENDING FALLS
Household consumption spending fell 1.4 percent in the March quarter, the biggest fall recorded since 1991.
The size of the quarterly decline in GDP caught many economists by surprise after they predicted a median 0.7 percent fall, although New Zealand’s Reserve Bank correctly predicted the 1 percent contraction.
Reserve Bank Governor Alan Bollard said recently he expected this quarter would show a further contraction, though some weak growth was likely by year end.
The central bank has slashed the official cash rate to 2.5 percent from 8.25 percent last July in a bid to halt the economy’s slide into deeper negative growth.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
A total of 41 US military personnel were stationed in Taiwan as of December last year, a US congressional report said on Friday last week ahead of Tuesday’s passage of an aid package that included US$8 billion for Taiwan. The Congressional Research Service in a report titled Taiwan Defense Issues for Congress said that according to the US Department of Defense’s Defense Manpower Data Center, 41 US military personnel were assigned for duty in Taiwan. Although the normalization of relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1979 included a vow to withdraw a military presence from Taiwan, “observers have indicated
The navy next month is expected to commission into service two more domestically built Tuo Chiang-class stealth missile corvettes, a source said yesterday. The Hsu Chiang (旭江, PGG-621) and the Wu Chiang (武江, PGG-623) would be officially commissioned in a ceremony early next month, the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The corvettes, launched in February and June last year respectively, were delivered to the navy in February. They are the third and fourth Tuo Chiang-class stealth missile corvettes to be produced. The Tuo Chiang-class corvette is a domestically designed and manufactured class of fast and stealthy multipurpose corvette built for the