Moldovan national institute experts anticipate four-per cent economic growth in 2018
12:52 | 23.10.2018 Category: Economic
Chisinau, 23 October /MOLDPRES/ - The Moldovan economy will grow by four per cent in 2018, against a 4.5-per cent increase recorded in the year before.
„We witness a recovery of the national economy the third year in a row, after the 2015 crisis, the proof being the 4.5- per cent growth in the first half and 5.2 per cent in the second quarter,” the director of the National Institute of Economic Researches (INCE), Alexandru Stratan, said while presenting the analytical bulletin Moldovan Economic Trends (MET).
According to INCE, the Gross Domestic Product will reach the nominal value of 190.5 billion lei, against 176.8 billion lei in 2017.
„The updated forecast differs a little from the prospects of the beginning of this year, when we were anticipating an economic growth of 3.8 per cent. First of all, it is about the seasonal factor; in the second half of the year, the growth paces will be a little lower than in the first six months of this year. And this is explained by the fact that, this year, we started the harvesting of agricultural crops earlier; thus, the impact of the agriculture will be less felt in the second half of the year. Secondly, the basis of comparison is quite high; in the third and fourth quarter of 2017, we had an economic growth of 5.3 and 6.4 per cent, respectively. The electoral campaign will have certain effects on the economic sector,” Stratan said.
The publication’s authors forecast a 23-per cent increase in exports, a 22.5-per cent growth of imports, a five-per cent increase in the industrial output and a four-per cent one of the agricultural one. Agriculture has been on the rise the third year in a row – a tendency recorded for the first time in the years of Moldova’s independence.
The INCE economists expect an increase of long-term active investments. The salary will reach the level of 6,445 lei and will register a real growth of 9.2 per cent and the unemployment rate will be of 3.8 per cent, experts forecast.
The Economics and Infrastructure Ministry and the International Monetary Fund forecast a 3.8-per cent increase of the Moldovan economy in 2018.
(Reporter V. Bercu, editor A. Raileanu)
