Macau, China 14 Dec - Secretary for Economy and Finance Francis Tam Pak Yuen, who will remain in his post beyond Sunday's government change, told reporters he estimated that Macau will suffer single-digit negative GDP growth in real terms this year, according to The Macau Post Daily.
However, he adds that he expected positive GDP growth to return next year.
In real terms, Macau's GDP rose 8.2 percent in the third quarter, after dropping 12 percent in the first and 15.3 percent in the second quarter of this year, according to the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC). In the first half of this year, GDP was down 13.6 percent. GDP dropped 8.3 percent in the fourth quarter of last year.
Economists attribute the negative GDP growth between the fourth quarter of last year and the second quarter of this year to the local impact of the global financial tsunami.
For the whole of last year, GDP was up 12.9 percent in real terms.
This year's predicted negative GDP growth would be the first for a whole year since the establishment of the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR) in December 1999.
Macau suffered negative economic growth in the late 1990s.
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