Oman's GDP falls 3.9% in Q1 of 2020

Muscat: The Sultanate's gross domestic product (GDP) at current market prices fell by 3.9 per cent to reach OMR6.75 billion at the end of March 2020, according to the provisional data released by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).
There was a rise in oil activities by 0.7 per cent at the end of March 2020, registering OMR2.42 billion compared to OMR2.41 billion at the end of March 2020.
The share of crude oil from among oil activities was OMR2.07 billion, which is an increase of 2.6 per cent at the end of March 2020, when it was OMR2.01 billion.
The activities of natural gas dropped by 9.1 per cent, reaching OMR356.7 million compared to OMR392.5 million at the end of March 2019.
Total non-oil activities declined by 6.2 per cent to OMR4.63 billion. Services activities were at the forefront of non-oil activities, which was at OMR3.33 billion, down by 5.2 per cent over OMR3.51 billion at the end of March 2019.
Hotels and restaurants, transport, storage and communications and financial brokerage activities fell by 14.7 per cent, 5.7 per cent and 4.8 per cent, respectively. Wholesale and retail trade, as well as pubic administration and defence activities also decreased by 10.5 per cent and 4.2 per cent, respectively.
Industrial activities dropped by 11.5 per cent to OMR1.10 billion at the end of the first quarter of 2020.
The manufacturing sector fell by 12.1 per cent, mining and quarrying by 37.9 per cent.
Basic chemical industry activities declined by 7.8 per cent, electricity, and water supply by 2.8 per cent. Other manufacturing industries fell by 12.1 per cent, and construction activities fell by 10.3 per cent.
The activities related to agriculture and fisheries sectors and real estate showed an increase of 10.3 per cent and 2.1 per cent to reach OMR195.4 million and OMR321.8 million, respectively, by the end of March 2020.