Italy is the only large country in the Eurozone and the EU to show negative growth in the first quarter of 2014. This is what emerges from the data published today by Eurostat. In the first three months of the year the GDP will be negative: -0,1% after +0,1% in the last quarter of 2013; compared to a year before -0,5% after -0,9%.
The German GDP instead increased by 0,8% compared to the fourth quarter of 2013 (+2,3% compared to the previous year), the French GDP recorded a +0,8%, the Spanish GDP +0,4%, the British +0,8% (+3,1% compared to the previous year). Negative growth also in Portugal (-0,7% compared to the fourth quarter of 2013), the Netherlands -1,4%, Finland -0,4%, Slovenia -0,3%, Estonia -1,2%, Cyprus 0,7 %.
“We must continue with structural reforms, then there is also the debt problem. The best way to reduce debt in conditions of stability is growth”. These are the words of the Minister of Economy, Pier Carlo Padoan, who underlined how "Italy has done and continues to do its homework on public finance, so much so that in 2011-2013 the value of the cumulative maneuvers was 67 billions".
Padoan also pointed out that Italian public finances are "much more sustainable than many other countries".
