Quarterly National Accounts – Third Quarter 2011
Highlights

Quarterly GDP
1. Throughout the period 2008 to 2010, the quarterly GDP follows the same seasonal pattern every year. The production is relatively low in the first quarter, increases gradually in the two subsequent quarters and peaks in the last quarter before declining in the first quarter of the following year.

Quarterly growth rate by industry group
(i) Second quarter 2011 over second quarter 2010
2. GDP growth for the second quarter of 2011 over the corresponding quarter of 2010 has been revised upward to 4.4% instead of 3.9% as estimated in September 2011.

(ii) Third quarter 2011 over third quarter 2010
3. GDP growth rate for the third quarter of 2011 over the corresponding quarter of 2010 is estimated at 3.7%. The main contributors to the 3.7% growth in GDP during the third quarter of 2011 were “Real estate, renting and business activities” (0.8 percentage point), “Transport, storage and communications” (0.5 percentage point), “Financial intermediation” (0.5 percentage point) and “Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles, motorcycles, personal and household goods” (0.4 percentage point).

Quarterly growth rates of components of expenditure
4. During the third quarter of 2011, total final consumption expenditure in real terms increased by 2.6% in the third quarter of 2011, higher than the 2.2% growth noted for the second quarter of 2011. The final consumption expenditure of households grew by 2.7% in the third quarter of 2011 compared to 1.8% in the previous quarter while that of general government grew by 2.1% compared to a growth of 4.0% in the second quarter of 2011

5. During the third quarter of 2011, investment picked up slightly by 0.2% during the third quarter of 2011 after the decline of 15.2% noted for the second quarter. The growth of 0.2% is explained by a growth of 3.9% in “Machinery and equipment” partly offset by a decline of 1.1% in “Building and construction work”.

6. The growth of 3.9% in “Machinery and equipment” in the third quarter of 2011 is attributable to a growth of 9.2% in “Other machinery and equipment” mitigated by declines of 6.4% and 11.1% in “Passenger car” and “Other transport equipment” respectively. The decline of 1.1% in “Building and construction work” in the third quarter of 2011 is explained by negative growths of 5.3% and 10.6% in “Non-residential building” and “Other construction work” respectively partly offset by a growth of 10.1% in “Residential building”.

7. Growths were registered for both exports and imports of goods and services in the third quarter of 2011. Exports of goods and services grew further by 9.9%, after the 4.7% in the second quarter of 2011. This is explained by growths of 1.9% and 17.9% in exports of goods and of services respectively.

8. Imports of goods and services grew by 10.9% in the third quarter of 2011 higher than the growth of 2.6% in the previous quarter. The 10.9% growth is attributable to growths in both imports of goods (+4.3%) and imports of services (+24.4%).

Quarter to quarter GDP growth (based on seasonally adjusted GDP)
9. Quarter to quarter GDP growth rates based on seasonally adjusted data show that the economy grew by 1.3% in the third quarter of 2011 compared to 0.7% in the second quarter of 2011.

December 2011

 

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