indicated that Peru's economy continues its recovery path, having registered consecutive growth in the first two quarters of this year.
"Last year we ended with a 0.5% GDP reduction. For this year, we have observed a recovery over two quarters. At first it was slight, 1.4%; it consolidated in the second quarter with 3.6%. For July, we expect a growth rate of 4%," Arista explained.
"This increase in economic activity is basically explained by the dissipation of shocks, such as El Niño phenomenon, and improvement in domestic demand," he emphasized.
Minister Arista explained that primary sectors, such as fishing, primary manufacturing, and agriculture, performed very well in the second quarter of 2024, in an environment where weather conditions were neutral, which allowed for a high catch of anchoveta fish during the first season in the north-central area and the recovery of agricultural production.
Domestic demand
On the other hand, he explained that domestic demand recovery was favored by higher public investment, which grew 24% by the end of 2024's first half compared to the accumulated figure registered by the end of the same period in 2023.
"Private consumption also recovered in a context of greater liquidity and a progressive reduction in financing costs," he said.
The Cabinet member mentioned that the
Central Reserve Bank (BCR) has been reducing its reference interest rate by approximately 100 basis points accumulated during the first half of this year.
Similarly, he stressed that the consolidation of business expectations will boost investment growth and economic activity.
"The confidence of economic agents remains in the optimistic range," he underlined.
Minister Arista indicated that the BCR conducts business surveys on 16 indicators, of which 12 relate to future expectations for the economy.
"These 12 variables have been at their peak over the last three months, all of them have been in the optimistic range," Arista underlined.
"In this case, what we see is that all the variables surveyed by the (Central Reserve) Bank based on business expectations are at the top of the optimistic range," he added.
The government official also highlighted that in the case of "three-month economic expectations," these have reached a higher level since November 2020.
"And the sector's three-month expectations, in the case of employment, reached 52.5 points, which is the highest level since March 2021," Arista noted.
"In this same line, expectations for hiring staff in three months reached 53.6 points, the highest level since September 2016. Since September 2016, we have not had such high expectations for hiring workers in a three-month period as we do now," he added.
Remarks were made during his presentation before Congress' Budget and General Accounts Commission on Monday.