Singapore expects positive recovery in year's latter half

Singapore’s economy will enjoy good growth in the second half of 2021 and continue to recover next year as global growth is projected to “remain positive,” S. Iswaran, Minister for Transport and Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations, has said in parliament.

Singapore’s economy will enjoy good growth in the second half of 2021 and continue to recover next year as global growth is projected to “remain positive,” S. Iswaran, Minister for Transport and Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations, has said in parliament.

According to the minister, one of the contributing factors to Singapore's growth is the global economic recovery is generally still on track, despite the risks posed by the pandemic. He said high vaccination rates in key advanced economies such as the US and the eurozone have allowed countries to continue to reopen even amid an increase in the number of COVID-19 cases. Furthermore, countries in the region are also ramping up vaccination efforts, which will facilitate the resumption of higher economic activity in the coming quarters, he added.

In addition, Singapore's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth in the first half of 2021 was better than expected, reaching 7.7 percent year-on-year.

The minister also highlighted the good progress in the country's vaccination, which has allowed Singapore to gradually relax domestic and border restrictions, thus easing the labour shortages in areas such as capital construction dependent on migrant workers and supporting the recovery of retail sector. However, he also warned that the travel and aviation related sectors are likely to recover slowly due to continued global travel restrictions and weak travel demand.

Singapore's Ministry of Industry and Trade (MTI) in August revised its growth forecast for this year to 6-7 percent -- up from an earlier outlook of 4-6 percent./.     

VNA