{"id":6074,"date":"2026-04-04T10:02:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T10:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/6074\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T10:02:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T10:02:00","slug":"oecd-cuts-eurozone-growth-forecast-as-energy-prices-surge-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/6074\/","title":{"rendered":"OECD cuts eurozone growth forecast as energy prices surge"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development lowered its growth forecast for the currency union by 0.4 percentage points to 0.8%, with the continent&#8217;s top two economies, Germany and France, also revised down to 0.8%.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The organisation also raised its inflation forecast for the eurozone by 0.7 points to 2.6%, while the global growth forecast remains at 2.9% for this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">&#8220;The energy price surge and the unpredictable nature of the evolving conflict in the Middle East will raise costs and lower demand, offsetting the tailwinds from strong technology-related investment and production, lower effective tariff rates and the momentum carried over from 2025,&#8221; it said in the report.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Higher than expected inflation could trigger a monetary policy response as soon as next month, if the European Central Bank sees that the 2% inflation target is in danger.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Traders have raised their bets on the ECB hiking interest rates as soon as next month to tame an expected surge in inflation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">However, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/business\/2026\/03\/25\/iran-war-energy-shock-puts-ecb-on-alert-lagarde-says-this-is-no-repeat-of-2022\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:ECB chief Christine Lagarde said;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;ECB chief Christine Lagarde said&quot;}\" class=\"link \">ECB chief Christine Lagarde said<\/a>on Wednesday that the eurozone is far better placed to absorb the shock than it was when Russia invaded Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">In their current report, the OECD noted that global growth had been holding up &#8220;well&#8221; before the war and that it could have been 0.3 percentage points higher had the conflict not escalated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Related<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The report assumes that energy disruptions will ease starting in mid-2026, though it warned of the uncertainties surrounding the war.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">&#8220;The breadth and duration of the conflict are very uncertain, but a prolonged period of higher energy prices will add markedly to business costs and raise consumer price inflation, with adverse consequences for growth,&#8221; it said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The organisation cites, in particular, the price of urea as one of the main nitrogen-based fertilisers, which has risen by more than 40% since mid-February, which could reduce crop yields in 2027.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The United States, which is facing high-stakes mid-term elections in November, is expected to fare better than other regions this year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Following growth of 2.1% in 2025, the forecast for the US economy has been raised by 0.3 percentage points to 2% in 2026.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">It is then seen slowing to 1.7% in 2027, down 0.2 points from the previous forecast, as strong AI-related investment is gradually offset by a slowdown in real income growth and consumer spending.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Related<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Chinese growth is still expected to reach 4.4% this year, then 4.3% in 2027.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The OECD attributes the slowdown to the end of public subsidies for consumption, rising energy import prices, and the ongoing adjustment of the real estate sector.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">To mitigate further energy shocks, the OECD called for &#8220;policies that improve domestic energy efficiency and lower reliance on imported fossil fuels&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">It also said that &#8220;agreements to ease trade tensions and deepen trade relations would improve policy certainty and strengthen the prospects for sustainable growth&#8221;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development lowered its growth forecast for the currency union by 0.4 percentage&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2480],"tags":[2169,88,2487,2486,1858,2485,5220,5219,3492,3243],"class_list":{"0":"post-6074","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-euro-zone","8":"tag-christine-lagarde","9":"tag-energy","10":"tag-euro-area","11":"tag-euro-zone","12":"tag-european-central-bank","13":"tag-eurozone","14":"tag-expected-inflation","15":"tag-global-growth","16":"tag-oecd","17":"tag-percentage-points"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}