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MAIN FEATURES EXPENDITURE CHAIN VOLUME MEASURES

			Trend			Seasonally adjusted
			% change Dec 07 to Mar 08	% change Mar 07 to Mar 08	% points contribution to growth in GDP Dec 07 to Mar 08	% change Dec 07 to Mar 08	% change Mar 07 to Mar 08	% points contribution to growth in GDP Dec 07 to Mar 08
Final consumption expenditure
	General government		1.0	3.9	0.2	0.4	3.5	0.1
	Households		1.1	4.6	0.6	0.7	4.3	0.4
Gross fixed capital formation
	Private
		Dwellings	-	-0.2	-	-	-0.7	-
		Business investment	np	np	np	1.5	6.9	0.2
		Ownership transfer costs	-3.6	-1.2	-0.1	-3.4	-0.9	-0.1
	Public		np	np	np	5.9	19.9	0.3
Changes in inventories
	Private non-farm		. .	. .	-	. .	. .	-
	Farm and public authority		. .	. .	-	. .	. .	-
Gross national expenditure			1.0	4.9	1.0	0.9	4.7	0.9
Exports of goods and services			0.2	2.6	-	0.5	2.7	0.1
Imports of goods and services			3.0	11.4	-0.7	3.5	11.5	-0.8
Statistical discrepancy (E)			. .	. .	0.4	. .	. .	0.5
Gross domestic product			0.7	3.7	0.7	0.6	3.6	0.6
. . not applicable
- nil or rounded to zero (including null cells)
np not available for publication but included in totals where applicable, unless otherwise indicated

• Household final consumption expenditure grew by 1.1% in trend terms (0.7% seasonally adjusted). The main contributors to growth were Other goods and services, Rent and Furnishings and household equipment.

• Private business investment grew 1.5% in seasonally adjusted terms. This increase was due to investment in New engineering construction (up 8.5%), and Total intangible fixed assets (up 4.0%), partially offset by the fall in New machinery and equipment (down 1.4%). Dwelling investment showed a flat result this quarter. This was due to an increase in New and used dwellings (up 0.5%), offset by the decrease in Alterations and additions (down 0.5%).

• Total inventories rose by $1,649m in trend terms, following a rise of $1,596m in the December quarter. Seasonally adjusted, total inventories rose by $1,510m following a $1,551m rise in the previous quarter. Changes in inventories contributed 0.0 percentage points to seasonally adjusted GDP growth during the quarter.

• In trend terms, Exports of goods and services rose 0.2% while in seasonally adjusted terms, it rose 0.5%. Seasonally adjusted Exports of goods rose 0.9%, driven by rises in Mineral ores (up 7.2%) and Cereal grain and cereal preps (up 39.4%), offsetting falls in Coal (down 7.7%) and Meat (down 8.4%). Exports of services fell 1.0%.
• Imports of goods and services increased 3.0% in trend terms and 3.5% in seasonally adjusted terms. Imports of goods, seasonally adjusted, increased 4.2%, with growth in Consumption goods (up 3.3%), Capital goods (up 8.5%), Intermediate goods (up 2.2%), and Other goods (up 6.5%). Imports of services rose 0.4%, driven by growth in Travel (up 0.2%) and Other services (up 2.3%).