| Follow us on:
|
![France has suffered negative growth in recent months due to recession [Getty Images]](http://thebricspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/175126459-300x199.jpg)
France has suffered negative growth in recent months due to recession [Getty Images]
On Thursday, INSEE forecast growth of 0.2 per cent – up from an initial figure of -0.1 made in June. The statistics report said that the French economy overcame a period of stagnation and expects the business environment to improve by the fourth quarter.
INSEE expects industrial sectors to gain momentum, while the country’s total manufacturing output would will increase by 0.4 per cent after it had fallen by 2.8 percent in 2012.
Consumer spending is also expected to make gains, the report added.
The revised figures are expected to be welcome news for many Eurozone countries struggling to pull out of continent-wide recession.
The statistics report is also likely to somewhat boost business confidence after a largely negative forecast from the London-based National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) in August.
NIESR had said that global economic growth predictions fell from 3.3 to 3.1 per cent for 2013, and that says that Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland, Netherlands, France and Slovenia faced further decline.
Earlier, the European Union’s Statistical Agency (EUROSTAT) announced in a report that unemployment figures had dipped or stabilised in some countries but that overall job recovery was happening at a very slow pace.
For France, the INSEE figures indicated that the unemployment rate will likely stabilise at 11 per cent by the end of 2013 “the sharp rise in the number of subsidized jobs in the non-market sector.”
Source: Agencies
