Four Provinces To Buck Recession

Although no province will be entirely immune to the economic downturn, there are 4 provinces that are showing great resiliency and one of those is Saskatchewan. Given that Canada and the US share the world’s largest trading partnership ($1.5 billion a day) it is impossible to be spared from the massive US economic slowdown, however 2 eastern provinces and 2 western provinces will be growing this year…although not without some difficulty.

As Saskatchewan and Manitoba have strong agricultural economies, this is expected to help us move forward this year. Manitoba is set to grow 1% in 2009 while Saskatchewan is supposed to lead the country with a 1.6% growth. On the East Coast it is New Brunswick with a small 0.2% economic growth and PEI with a 0.6% growth. Both provinces have infrastructure and major capital projects on the go.

Newfoundland and Labrador may have two of the worst economies due to the impact of declining offshore oil output and may shrink by an estimated 2.6%. Ontario will struggle due to the manufacturing aspect with the auto industry and manufacturing is also hurting Quebec’s growth.

Alberta’s economy, which is heavily reliant on the energy industry, is forecasted to weaken as oil prices continue to go down and expensive oil sands projects are put on hold.

Overall, the Canadian economy will shrink 0.9% this year which is revised from the autumn forecast of a GDP growth of 2.2%

It is widely believed that the Canadian economy will rebound in 2010, expanding 3.6%. Good thing that the Saskatchewan economy is already strong!

Kari Calder
Saskatoon Real Estate Agent
Century 21 Conexus Realty Ltd.

This entry was posted on 16. March 2009 at 04:11 and is filed under News, Saskatchewan News, Saskatoon News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.