Within the goods producing industries, manufacturing output grew at slower pace of 8.6 percent (vs 9.7 percent in the previous quarter), with all clusters expanding during the quarter and electronics and biomedical engineering contributing the most to the sector’s growth. On the other hand, construction output shrank by 4.4 percent after a 5.2 percent contraction in the previous quarter, explained primarily by weakness in private construction works.
The services producing industries also lost steam, expanding 3.4 percent in the second quarter after growing by 4.0 percent in the previous three months. Growth was mainly supported by finance & insurance and wholesale & retail trade.
On a quarter-on-quarter seasonally-adjusted annualized basis, the GDP rose by 1.0 percent, below the 1.5 percent expansion in the previous quarter.
The Ministry of Trade and Industry expects GDP growth for 2018 between 2.5 to 3.5 percent.