BERLIN: The German economy is expected to have grown robustly in the first quarter led by private consumption and state spending, but the outlook for the rest of the year is less clear, the Finance Ministry said on Thursday.
Growth in the first three months was driven by private consumption and state spending, it said in its monthly report, adding that overall tax income rose 7.1 percent year on year in March.
Prospects for the rest of the year were mixed, notably given uncertainties about global growth and security and the impact of a huge influx of migrants.
"A further lack of clarity concerning the growth outlooks in emerging economies as well as a deterioration of geopolitical conflicts would particularly impact German exporters because of their product ranges," the report said.
It also cited fluctuations of oil prices and exchange rates among possible risks to the economy. Government spending to care for the more than 1 million migrants who arrived in the country last year has contributed to a rise in private consumption, which is also fuelled by low interest rates and a robust labour market.
But the economic consequences of an as yet unquantifiable influx of asylum seekers remained "highly uncertain," the ministry said. Germany's leading economic institutes said last week they expected the economy to have grown 0.6 percent in the first quarter.
Citing waning demand from abroad for German goods and services due to the global slowdown, they cut their 2016 growth forecast for Europe's largest economy to 1.6 percent from 1.8 percent.
The government on Wednesday stuck to its forecast of 1.7 percent.
German first quarter gross domestic product data is due in mid-May.
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