The UAE’s Central Bank has raised its forecast for non-oil GDP growth in 2018 to 3.9 percent from 3.6 percent, it said in a tweet on Tuesday.
The stronger forecast comes as non-oil economic activity in the UAE grew by 3.1 percent in the first quarter, slowing slightly from 3.4 percent in the final quarter of 2017.
Overall economic activity, which includes oil output, grew by 1.2 percent in the first quarter, it added.
For 2019, the central bank said it expects overall GDP to expand 3.1 percent on the back of 4.3 percent growth in the non-oil economy and a 0.1 percent uptick in oil GDP.
The central bank also noted that the UAE’s residential real estate market continued to decline in Q1, with prices dropping 4.2 percent from a year earlier in Dubai and 7.8 percent in Abu Dhabi.
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