GDP growth fell to 0.7% in 2019: MTI

Contraction under the manufacturing sector worsened to 1.5%.

Singapore’s economy grew 0.7% in 2019, crashing from 3.1% in 2018, advance estimates from the Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) revealed. On a QoQ basis, GDP rose 0.8% YoY in Q4 from 0.7% in Q3 2019, moderating by 0.1ppt.

The contraction in the manufacturing sector worsened to 1.5% in 2019 from 0.1% in 2018, whilst the growth in the construction sector eased to 2.5% from 2.7% over the same period. Expansion in the services producing industries also slowed down to 1.1% from 1.2%.

In Q4, the manufacturing sector declined further by 2.1% YoY and reversed to a 7.3% QoQ saa contraction. This was blamed on fall in output in the electronics, chemicals and transport engineering clusters, despite expansions in the precision engineering, biomedical manufacturing and general manufacturing clusters.

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In contrast, the construction sector rose 2.1% YoY and QoQ saa, supported by public sector construction activities. Although it slowed down from 2.4% YoY in Q3, its QoQ growth turned around the 1.7% slip in the preceding quarter.

Furthermore, the services producing industries expanded 1.4% YoY and 2.4% QoQ, from 0.9% and 0.6% over the same period, respectively. This was primarily supported by the finance & insurance sector, the other services industries, and the business services sector.

However, wholesale & retail trade sector contracted in tandem with the weakness in our exports and retail sales performance.