Seoul [South Korea], October 27 (ANI/Global Economic): With increased exports, Korea's economy grew 0.3 per cent in the third quarter of this year. As the growth rate slowed down in the third quarter, it is expected to be difficult to achieve a four per cent growth rate, which was predicted by the Bank of Korea (BOK), this year.

According to the 2021 Third Quarter Real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) report released by the Bank of Korea on the 26th, real GDP in the third quarter increased 0.3 per cent from the previous quarter. Compared to the third quarter of last year, when the economy had slowed down due to COVID-19, it increased four per cent.

Although it has been on the rise for five consecutive quarters since negative growth in the first quarter of last year (-1.3 per cent) and the second quarter (-3.2 per cent), the growth rate slowed significantly considering that it grew 1.7 per cent and 0.8 per cent in the first and second quarters of this year, respectively. It is also lower than the market forecast of 0.4 to 0.6 per cent.

Hwang Sang-pil, director of the statistics department at the BOK, said, "The 0.3 per cent growth in the third quarter is due to global supply-chain bottlenecks such as decreased personal consumption, automobile semiconductor supply-chain disruptions, and imbalance in supply and demand of construction materials. But this is not something to worry about much."However, it is expected that it will be difficult to achieve four per cent annual growth this year. The BOK previously predicted that if GDP growth in the third and fourth quarters reaches more than 0.6 per cent, respectively, it will achieve an annual growth rate of four per cent.

The BOK, however, predicted that it is still possible to achieve annual growth of four per cent. "The third-quarter economic growth rate is not much different from last August's forecast," director Hwang said. "If the growth rate in the fourth quarter exceeds 1.04 per cent, it is possible to achieve an annual growth rate of four per cent."Director Hwang said, "There are still risk factors such as global supply-chain disruptions, increased economic uncertainty in China, and rising energy prices, but Korea's economy is expected to continue to recover due to positive factors such as expanding vaccination rates, easing quarantine regulations, and a second supplementary budget." (ANI/Global Economic)