GDP growth in the OECD slows down in the second quarter with 0.4%

Economic growth in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) as a whole slowed slightly in the second quarter of 2023, with 0.4%one tenth less than in the first, with a contrasting evolution among the member countries that reveals a plurality of situations.

The OECD said this Monday, August 28, in a statement that, in year-on-year terms, the gross domestic product (GDP or GDP) at the end of June in the “club of developed countries” was 1.5%, compared to 1, 6% at the end of March.

Among the large economies of this bloc, the greatest increase in GDP between April and June was that of Japan, with 1.5% compared to the previous quarter, thanks to the boost in net exports (foreign sales minus purchases), after a rise that had already been very significant between January and March (0.9%).

At the opposite extreme, Italy suffered a decrease of 0.3% in its activity due to the effect of the contraction of domestic demandafter having risen 0.6% in the first quarter.

It was not the only country in the OECD which had a quarterly contraction of GDP. There were ten in total, notably Poland (-3.7%), Sweden (-1.5%) and Colombia (-1%).

Among the members of the G7, Germany stagnated between April and June, after having experienced two consecutive quarters of decline, which is considered from a technical point of view an entry into recession. This was the only G7 country with a decline in GDP in year-on-year terms at the end of June (-0.1%).

Spain, the country most affected by the pandemic

The OECD emphasized, in its statement, that Spain, which had been the country most economically affected by the pandemic (its GDP sank 11.3% in 2020), exceeded its level of activity for the first time in the second quarter of 2023. precovid, that is, the one he had at the end of 2019.

Specifically, it exceeded that level by 0.4% when in the OECD as a whole the GDP was 5.1% higher than the pre-covid benchmark and in the United States (one of the fastest recoveries) it was 6.2%. . The United States is also the G7 country with the steepest year-on-year rise at the end of June, at 2.6%, clearly above the second, Japan (2.1%)..

Among the large countries, only the United Kingdom continued in the second quarter without having recovered the activity prior to the pandemic (-0.2%). In Germany, this recovery was still very timid (0.2%) and in the euro zone as a whole (including, therefore, Germany and Spain), 2.7%.