By NNN-Bernama
Kuala Lumpur : Second Finance Minister Nor Mohamed Yakcop reiterated that the government was confident of achieving six percent economic growth this year.
The projection has been based on the growth rate of 6.7 percent achieved in the third quarter of this year, he said.
“In our budget, we had set the Gross Domestic Product growth target at six percent this year. But many analysts and research organisations had initially disagreed with our target and projected GDP growth at 5.7 and 5.8 percent only.
“But we have now proven that our projection was right and we have witnessed an impressive growth of 6.7 percent for the third quarter. Therefore we are confident that the country will be able to achieve the six percent growth this year,” he told reporters after officiating his ministry’s sports fair here today.
Nor Mohamed said the country’s growth was very good despite the current global challenges.
He said the country was also less dependent on exports now as its economy was diversified to other sources including domestic consumption.
For the third quarter this year, public consumption went up 14 percent and investment 30 percent.
He said the country would continue to diversify its economic base.
Nor Mohamed said the government was also confident of reducing its deficit rate to 3.2 percent this year and to 3.1 percent in 2008 from 3.3 percent in 2006 and 5.5 percent in 2000.
He said the country’s reserve position was also good, surpassing US$100 billion currently while the Employees Provident Fund exceeded RM300 billion.
On foreign investments, Nor Mohamed said investors remained confident of the country’s economy.
“They like Malaysia’s pragmatic approach. They admit that Malaysia has a good system to attract investors,” he said.
Nor Mohamed also expressed confidence that the issue of Hindraf will not jeopardise the entry of investments into the country.