PODGORICA (Montenegro), November 6 (SeeNews) – Montenegro's government forecasts 1.0% economic growth for next year when the Adriatic country would start slowly exiting the crisis, a senior cabinet member said.
“This will be a good base to enter from 2011 into what was typical for our economy in the 2006-2008 period, when we saw extremely high growth rates of six to eight percent,” deputy Prime Minister in charge of economic policy and financial system Vuijca Lazovic said after a government meeting on Thursday. An audio file with his remarks is uploaded on the government's website.
Lazovic said the Montenegrin economy contracted 4.0% on the year to 2.67 billion euro ($3.98 billion) in the first nine months of 2009. The fall was mainly due to a 31% drop in the January-September industrial production, a 21% slide in the value of construction works in the six months to June, and an 11% decrease in trade turnover in the first eight months of the year.
Lazovic said the contraction was not bigger thanks to low and stable inflation of 1.7% in September, a 15% annual increase in net foreign direct investment to 454 million euro in the first eight months, and stable tourism revenue at last year’s level.
Trade turnover dropped by an annual 40% to 1.413 million euro in the January-September period. Trade deficit fell 39% on the year through September to 37% of the gross domestic product projected for 2009.
($=0.6736 euro)