Gov't says Korea's export growth slowing down

Korea's exports are growing at a much slower pace than previously expected, a senior government official said Friday, casting a gloomy outlook for the country's main growth engine in the second half of the year.

Cho Seok, the vice minister of knowledge economy, noted the difficulties largely stemmed from the debt crisis in Europe, but also the slowing down of the Chinese economy, South Korea's largest trading partner.

"The first half of the year was a period marked by uncertainties created by the eurozone crisis and slower than expected Chinese growth," he told a meeting with officials from the country's large exporting companies.

The vice minister said conditions will continue to worsen for some time due to the global economic downturn.

The Ministry of Knowledge Economy earlier predicted the country's exports to gain 6.7 percent from last year to US$595 billion. A state-run think tank, however, said the exports will grow only about 3 percent this year to $572 billion due to what it called "a slowdown of the global economy, especially in advanced countries."

The Korea Institute for Industrial Economics and Trade said conditions in the second half will somewhat improve but that the country's exporters will continue to suffer from dwindling overseas demand.

"A quick improvement will be hard to achieve due to shrinking demand in advanced countries, as well as price drops caused by oversupply and protectionist measures by developing countries," it said. (Yonhap)