Cent. African Growth Seen Slowing As Crisis Bites

Growth in the Economic Community of West African States was previously forecast at 5.8 percent.

Economic growth in a six-nation central African bloc will be a slower than expected 5.3 percent this year as the world heads towards recession, central African finance chiefs said on Thursday.

Growth in the Economic Community of West African States (CEMAC), which comprises Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon, was previously forecast at 5.8 percent.

"Macroeconomic indicators for 2008 have been modified ... to take into account recent changes in the international economic environment," the Monetary Union of Central Africa said in a statement.

The rate of inflation in the bloc will be 5 percent, up from 4.2 percent forecast in July, the group said.

Expected growth rates across the world's poorest continent have been downwardly revised as a severe recession in the economies of rich nations elsewhere in the world grows likelier.

The International Monetary Fund recently cut its 2008 and 2009 projections for sub-Saharan Africa to 6 percent for both years from 6.5 percent in 2007, while the Governor of the Bank of Central African States put CEMAC growth at 5 percent for this year when he spoke to journalists last month.

Rapidly falling prices of oil, produced by five of the six CEMAC states, were leaving central African economies vulnerable to further global economic turmoil, Thursday's statement said.

A barrel of crude was priced at around $54 in New York on Thursday after falling last week to $48, its lowest in more than three years and almost $100 below its July peak.