AFP, Singapore :
Singapore’s trade-driven economy grew 1.8 percent last year, the slowest pace since the global financial crisis in 2009, after dodging a technical recession in the fourth quarter, official data showed Tuesday.
Analysts warned growth in 2017 could even be more subdued if rising protectionism crimps global trade and further rises in US interest rates put more pressure on the local economy.
“Singapore has comfortably dodged a technical recession in Q4 2016, but we expect the local economy to remain in ‘slow-mo’,” said Weiwen Ng, Southeast Asia economist at banking group ANZ.
“The prospects of a more protectionist trade policy poses headwinds to Singapore’s economy who is still wedded to the old export-led growth model,” Ng said in a note.
There have been concerns among Asia’s export-driven economies about rising protectionism in the West, where globalisation and free-trade deals have been blamed for sending jobs abroad and opening the floodgates to immigrants.
