RIO DE JANEIRO, June 1 (Xinhua) -- Brazil's gross domestic product (GDP) increased 1 percent in the first quarter of 2017 compared to the fourth quarter of 2016, reaching 1.594 trillion reals (490.5 billion U.S. dollars), the country's statistics agency IBGE said on Thursday.
Compared with the same period of 2016, however, the GDP in the quarter went down 0.4 percent.
With the growth registered in the first quarter, Brazil has officially started to leave behind a two-year-long recession. The positive figures can be largely attributed to a good performance of the agricultural sector, whose GDP was up 13.4 percent quarter-on-quarter and 15.2 percent compared to the same period last year.
Despite the positive GDP figures, industry and unemployment indicators remain negative, which means recovery may take longer and is more complicated than the government expects.
The industrial and services sectors' performed much differently: the industrial sector grew by 0.9 percent over the fourth quarter and shrank 1.1 percent from the first quarter last year, while the services sector remained stable as in the previous quarter and came down 1.7 percent from the same period in 2016.
President Michel Temer hailed the results and published a video on social networks, saying Brazil is leaving the recession behind and soon other indicators will show positive figures as well.
However, Brazil is still deeply stuck in a political crisis which is bound to cause more economic consequences. Temer's own presidency is threatened by the Supreme Court's investigations over corruption and obstruction of justice.
