Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?

The economic outlook for 2018 remains uncertain, partly hinging on the execution of the state budget. Economic activity was sluggish in the first half of 2018, as inferred by lacklustre public spending, weakened trade levels, and slower credit grow...

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Main Author: World Bank Group
Format: Report
Language:English
Published: World Bank, Washington, DC 2018
Subjects:
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/756821542739478616/Timor-Leste-Economic-Report-Regaining-Momentum
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/30998
id okr-10986-30998
recordtype oai_dc
spelling okr-10986-309982021-05-25T09:20:21Z Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum? World Bank Group ECONOMIC GROWTH ECONOMIC OUTLOOK FISCAL TRENDS MONETARY POLICY EXTERNAL TRADE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT EDUCATION QUALITY CONSTRUCTION PUBLIC SERVICES The economic outlook for 2018 remains uncertain, partly hinging on the execution of the state budget. Economic activity was sluggish in the first half of 2018, as inferred by lacklustre public spending, weakened trade levels, and slower credit growth. The recently approved 2018 budget proposes a substantial expenditure increase in the last four months of the year, to offset eighteen months of constrained spending. This presents a significant challenge for the public sector and budget execution rates may be lower than usual, due to the limited time to spend funds. Moreover, a proportion of the 2018 budget will be used to settle previous financial commitments for activities already undertaken, expenditure arrears, rather than create new economic activity. Overall, it is unlikely that this expansionary fiscal stance will considerably influence domestic economic activity in the short-term. GDP is forecast to grow by 0.8 percent in 2018, under a fairly positive scenario for budget execution. Political uncertainty affected consumer and business confidence until recently, but private investment may pick up in late 2018. The construction sector is set to recover, partly through the Tibar Bay Port, as well as agriculture if weather conditions are favourable. The broader implications of two consecutive years of disappointing economic performance are yet to be gauged, such as the impact on employment levels and earnings, labour productivity, and household incomes. In the medium-term, economic growth is expected to recover by 2019. 2018-12-18T18:01:10Z 2018-12-18T18:01:10Z 2018-10 Report http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/756821542739478616/Timor-Leste-Economic-Report-Regaining-Momentum http://hdl.handle.net/10986/30998 English CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Economic & Sector Work :: Economic Updates and Modeling Economic & Sector Work East Asia and Pacific Timor-Leste
repository_type Digital Repository
institution_category Foreign Institution
institution Digital Repositories
building World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection World Bank
language English
topic ECONOMIC GROWTH
ECONOMIC OUTLOOK
FISCAL TRENDS
MONETARY POLICY
EXTERNAL TRADE
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
EDUCATION QUALITY
CONSTRUCTION
PUBLIC SERVICES
spellingShingle ECONOMIC GROWTH
ECONOMIC OUTLOOK
FISCAL TRENDS
MONETARY POLICY
EXTERNAL TRADE
SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
EDUCATION QUALITY
CONSTRUCTION
PUBLIC SERVICES
World Bank Group
Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
geographic_facet East Asia and Pacific
Timor-Leste
description The economic outlook for 2018 remains uncertain, partly hinging on the execution of the state budget. Economic activity was sluggish in the first half of 2018, as inferred by lacklustre public spending, weakened trade levels, and slower credit growth. The recently approved 2018 budget proposes a substantial expenditure increase in the last four months of the year, to offset eighteen months of constrained spending. This presents a significant challenge for the public sector and budget execution rates may be lower than usual, due to the limited time to spend funds. Moreover, a proportion of the 2018 budget will be used to settle previous financial commitments for activities already undertaken, expenditure arrears, rather than create new economic activity. Overall, it is unlikely that this expansionary fiscal stance will considerably influence domestic economic activity in the short-term. GDP is forecast to grow by 0.8 percent in 2018, under a fairly positive scenario for budget execution. Political uncertainty affected consumer and business confidence until recently, but private investment may pick up in late 2018. The construction sector is set to recover, partly through the Tibar Bay Port, as well as agriculture if weather conditions are favourable. The broader implications of two consecutive years of disappointing economic performance are yet to be gauged, such as the impact on employment levels and earnings, labour productivity, and household incomes. In the medium-term, economic growth is expected to recover by 2019.
format Report
author World Bank Group
author_facet World Bank Group
author_sort World Bank Group
title Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
title_short Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
title_full Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
title_fullStr Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
title_full_unstemmed Timor-Leste Economic Report, October 2018 : Regaining Momentum?
title_sort timor-leste economic report, october 2018 : regaining momentum?
publisher World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate 2018
url http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/756821542739478616/Timor-Leste-Economic-Report-Regaining-Momentum
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/30998
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