Cairo – Mubasher: Egypt’s GDP growth slowed down during the third quarter of the fiscal year 2018, recording 5.3%, compared to 5.4% a quarter earlier.
The slowdown in the country’s GDP growth stemmed from the decline in the investment’s contribution to the GDP, according to the monetary policy report of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE).
“Growth softened mainly due to the construction and the non-petroleum manufacturing sectors, in addition to small weakness in other sectors. This has more than offset the improvement in tourism, communication and natural gas extractions,” the report said.
The unemployment rate inched up to 10% in Q3-18, the CBE’s data showed.
The central bank announced that the “annual headline inflation declined to 12% in December 2018 from 15.7% in November 2018, thereby leading average inflation during 2018 Q4 to record 15.1%.”
Consequently, the CBE’s inflation target for the fourth quarter of 2018, 13%, has been achieved, the report revealed.
Earlier in April, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that the CBE was expected to maintain its tight monetary policy as long as inflation does not start a downward trend.
In March, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) decided to maintain the current interest rates unchanged during March.
