SOFIA (Bulgaria), February 6 (SeeNews) – Moldova posted the highest gross domestic product (GDP) growth in Southeast Europe (SEE), of 5.9%, and the highest average annual inflation, in the third quarter of 2014, official statistics indicated.
Serbia and Croatia were the only two countries in SEE to record GDP declines - by an annual 3.6% and 0.5%, respectively, in the July-September period, according to a report by SeeNews Competitive Intelligence. The report is available at https://intelligence.seenews.com.
The report is based on data collected from national statistics offices, countries’ central banks, financial regulators, stock exchanges and other public institutions in eleven countries in SEE - Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia and Turkey.
One reason for Serbia’s negative economic performance was the 2.9% year-on-year decrease in exports, along with a 3.3% annual rise in imports, according to the report.
Prices of products and services increased in most of SEE countries in the third quarter, with Turkey posting the highest average annual inflation, of 8.5%, followed by Moldova with 5.2%. Bulgaria and Macedonia reported average annual deflation of 1.6% and 0.7%, respectively, while prices in Croatia remained almost flat at 0.1% on the year.
In the third quarter of 2014, the SEE countries succeeded in halting jobless numbers growth but unemployment rates remained high, hampering economic development.
Moldova, with a labour force of 1.253 million, had the lowest unemployment rate in the region, of 3.3%, at the end of September.