JAKARTA. Indonesia’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth, which slowed sharply to 5.2 percent year-on-year (yoy) in the first quarter of 2014 from 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, was well below general expectations of 5.6 percent and also the weakest since the 4.3 percent growth experienced in the third quarter of 2009, an expert said. UOB economic-treasury research analyst, Ho Woei Chen, said despite stronger private consumption and fixed investment growth, the headline number was weighed down by a contraction in net exports. “The underperformance in exports was largely associated with the implementation of the mineral export ban on nickel and bauxite in January,” he said in a release made available to The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.
The mining and quarrying sector contracted by 0.4 percent yoy during the quarter. “As a result of the disappointing growth in the first quarter of 2014, we have downgraded our full-year growth forecast for Indonesia to 5.5 percent from 5.8 percent,” Ho said. “This is at the lower end of Bank Indonesia’s (BI) forecast range of 5.5 – 5.9 percent,” he went on.