The world economy [June 1991]

This brief article provides an analysis of key world economic trends based on recent data. In the calendar year 1990, GDP growth in the G7 countries was 2.3%, compared with 2.8% in the year to June 1990. As has been the pattern for over a year, growth was sluggish in all the main industrialised countries with the exception of West Germany and Japan. The English-speaking countries have been particularly slow in terms of economic growth, with the United States, Canada and UK all exhibiting annual growth of no more than 1%. Individual country growth rates are as follows: Canada 0.9%; US 1.0%; Japan 5.6%; France 2.8%; Germany 4.6%; Italy 1.8%; UK 0.8%. The rapid slowing of many economies is most evident in terms of industrial production. In the final quarter of 1990 there was a marked slump in OECD industrial production, which achieved just 0.3% growth for the year, compared with 2.6% during the year to September