France’s Le Maire: economic growth will be better in 2021 than current 6.25% forecast

PARIS – French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Monday that France’s economic growth this year will be better than the government’s forecast of 6.25%, even though inflation was currently strong and weighing on people’s spending power.

“Let’s stick to the official forecast of 6.25% but I think we’ll do better,” Le Maire told BFM TV.

“We will do better,” Le Maire again told BFM TV, when asked by BFM TV about a possible growth figure of 6.5 percent.

Last week, France’s central bank raised its growth forecast again for 2021, to 6.7% versus 6.3% in September and 5.8% in June.

(Reporting by Benoit Van Overstraeten; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta)