First European country
Ireland is officially in recession - defined as two successive quarters of negative growth - according to economic data from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) published today.
The AFP writes:
...[Ireland] has been hammered by the international credit crisis, a severe property and construction industry downturn, weak consumer spending, sky-high oil prices and the strong euro.
AFP: Ireland is first eurozone nation in recession
Irish gross domestic product (GDP) shrank 0.5 percent in the second quarter of 2008 compared with the previous three-month period when the economy contracted 0.3 percent, according to the CSO.
Julian Callow, Europe economist at Barclays Capital has told reporters:
"Ireland is suffering from a massive reliance on real estate. Construction was 21pc of GDP at the peak last year, which is even worse than Spain (18pc) and far worse than America (11pc) at the height of the bubble,"
Ireland leads eurozone into recession - Telegraph
Old news for Ireland's Domestic Energy Assessors, no doubt, who've probably experienced the pain since Energy Performance Certificates were launched just a few months ago.
Locally, I counted seven properties for sale by the 'mortgagees in possession' in my local rag last week - the highest number I've seen for several years. I'd say we too are in recession, we just don't know it, officially.
