MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguay's economy grows 4.4% in 2021, Central Bank says

Wednesday's results were consistent with forecasts by the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF)

According to a study by Uruguay's Central Bank released Wednesday, the country's economy has grown 4.4% in 2021, despite all COVID-19 restrictions. The new figures show a recovery from 2020's fall due to the sanitary measures in force, which led to a decline in GDP of 5.9%.

The National Accounts report published Wednesday corresponding to the last quarter of last year showed “economic activity in 2021 increased 4.4% with respect to 2020, a result that reflected a recovery of the economic situation associated with the covid-19 health emergency.”

In the last three months of 2021, Uruguay's GDP grew 5.9% compared to the same quarter of the previous year, while in seasonally adjusted terms the economy grew 2.0% compared to the immediately preceding quarter.

Economist Nicolás Cichevski said through his Twitter account that ”in the regional comparison, compared to the pre-pandemic level Uruguay closed the year with a performance similar to Argentina, Paraguay and the U.S. In the last semester the performance was especially good compared to Brazil (stagnant throughout 2021) and, Paraguay and Europe (stagnant in the 2nd semester).“

He also pointed out that in the last quarter those sectors with the highest year-on-year growth ”were those linked to the activities affected by the pandemic: health, education and others (5.1%), transport (9%), trade (7%)“, while ”industries maintain dynamism” by registering an increase of 8%.

Wednesday's results were consistent with forecasts by the Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF), which had heralded the economy would have grown 4.5% in 2021, a projection that had been revised upwards in February from 3.5%.

“After having recovered its pre-pandemic level around July-September, Uruguay's GDP stood at 2.9% in the fourth quarter over its value for the same quarter of 2019 (pre-pandemic).

”The strong dynamism shown by the Uruguayan economy between the first and fourth quarters of 2021 (+7.4%) generated a high statistical drag (3.6%) for 2022. That would be the growth if the GDP remained stagnant throughout this year at its level of the fourth quarter,” Economist Aldo Lema said also on Twitter.