MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine economy expanded by 7.1 percent in the third quarter of the year, the fastest in Asia, higher than the revised second quarter growth of 7 percent — the Philippines Statistics Authority (PSA) announced on Thursday.
The country's latest GDP growth rate is the highest since the second quarter of 2013 (7.6 percent).
The PSA said the services sector, which posted a growth of 6.9 percent, contributed much to the third quarter's economic performance this year.
"Services gave the highest contribution to the GDP growth in the third quarter of 2016 with 4.1 percentage points," said National Economic and Development Authority Director Reynaldo Cancio said at a news conference.
The industry sector, meanwhile, accelerated by 8.6 percent this year, considerably higher than the 6.1 percent rate in 2015.