Staff Writer
According to a preliminary assessment released by the national statistics office on Wednesday, the Dutch economy shrank for the second consecutive quarter, indicating a “mild recession” there.
According to a statement from the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), the decline during the second quarter was 0.3 percent after the first three months of 2023 showed a contraction of 0.4 percent.
The CBS reported that despite higher spending in the culture and leisure sectors, the Dutch “mostly bought less furniture and clothing” in the third quarter, which contributed significantly to the contraction.
An other important contributor to the slowdown was international commerce, which saw a rise in imports and a decline in exports, especially from the Dutch chemical sector.
According to the most often used definition, Peter Hein van Mulligen, chief economist for the CBS, stated in a presentation posted online on Wednesday, “This means that the Netherlands is in recession.”
According to the data, the Dutch economy appears to have stalled for a fourth straight quarter.
According to van Mulligen, the lack of growth has not yet resulted in a downturn in the labor market.
The Dutch economy “recovered more quickly and strongly” than the rest of Europe following the slump brought on by the Covid-19 outbreak, but for the past year, it has gone the other way, he added.
The Netherlands’ decrease of 0.3 percent contrasts with the modest rise of 0.5 and 0.2 percent in France and Belgium in the second quarter.
