It has been confirmed that Australia has narrowly avoided going into recession, with the Australian economy growing 0.4 per cent in the March quarter.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, in seasonally adjusted terms, GDP increased by 0.4 per cent in the March quarter. Which means the economy has avoided two consecutive periods of negative growth, which is how a recession is measured.
The news has surprised many economists who heavily tipped that the economy will contract over the quarter.
According to the ABS the main positive contributors to expenditure on GDP were imports (1.6 percentage points), exports (0.6 percentage points) and household final consumption expenditure (0.3 percentage points).
Unfortunately for small businesses the largest negative contributor was private business investment which fell 1.1 percentage points.
Although this news is great for the Australian economy, many economists are claiming that the country is actually suffering from a recession and the latest figures have only been spurred on by economic stimulus packages and interest rate cuts.