Doha – Mubasher: Qatar's economy is expected to grow in the second half of the fiscal year 2016, according to a report by QNB.
The report built its estimates on GDP data for the second quarter of 2016 released last week.
"In real terms, the economy picked up by 2.0% year-over-year in the second quarter, compared to a 1.4% gain in the first quarter. This puts real GDP growth for the first half of the year at 1.7% year-over-year", according to the report.
Despite the decline in the hydrocarbon sector con (-1.2%) in the second quarter, the report found it a sort of improvement over the decline of 2.9% year-over-year experienced in the first quarter and drove overall real GDP higher.
In terms of the non-hydrocarbon sector, annual growth was 5.5% in the second quarter, slowing from 6.2% in the first quarter and growth in the first half of 2016 stood at 5.8%, the indicated, assuring "weakness in the manufacturing sector was the main driver of the quarterly decline and was attributable to lower production of basic chemicals and plastics".
In addition, population growth has gone up to 8.7% in the third quarter, compared to 6.7% in the first six months, which should support demand for the service sector, adding to non-hydrocarbon sector growth.
