Outlook and appraisal [December 1989]

The economic prospects for 1990 appear very uncertain, following a year in which the Scottish economy has shown signs of out-performing the UK on some indicators. The index of production for the second quarter of 1989 makes encouraging reading. In the year to the end of June production and construction industry output rose by 4.5% compared with 2.2% for the UK as a whole. When only production industries are included (i.e. construction is ignored), Scotland's relative performance looks even better, with growth of 5.1% in the year to June compared with UK growth of just 1.6%. When the petroleum and natural gas sectors are removed, however, the relative performance is less impressive; 4.5% for Scotland compared with 6% for the UK. Most of this favourable performance stems from fairly rapid output growth in the second quarter of the year in Scotland, a rise of 3.2% while the index of production and construction fell for the UK by 0.9% during that quarter