{"id":593377,"date":"2026-05-19T23:39:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T23:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/593377\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T23:39:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T23:39:10","slug":"un-lowers-forecast-for-global-economic-growth-in-2026-over-mideast-energy-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/593377\/","title":{"rendered":"UN lowers forecast for global economic growth in 2026 over Mideast energy crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it&#8217;s investigating the financials of Elon Musk&#8217;s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, &#8216;The A Word&#8217;, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n<p>Your support makes all the difference.Read more<\/p>\n<p> Responding to Middle East crises and rising oil prices, the United Nations on Tuesday lowered its forecast for global economic growth and raised the prospects for inflation this year.<\/p>\n<p>U.N. economists said global GDP growth is now forecast at 2.5% for 2026, down from 2.7% in January, and they said it could fall to only 2.1% \u201cin a more adverse scenario.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That would be one of the weakest growth rates this century, outside of the COVID-19 pandemic and the global financial crisis of 2008, Shantanu Mukherjee, director of economic analysis in the U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs, said at a news conference.<\/p>\n<p>Global inflation is projected to rise to 3.9% this year, 0.8% higher than forecast in January, before the U.S. and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/israel\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Israel<\/a> launched airstrikes on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/iran\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Iran<\/a>. That nation responded by blocking the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/strait-of-hormuz\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Strait of Hormuz<\/a>, a critical waterway for shipments of oil, natural gas, fertilizer and other petroleum products. <\/p>\n<p>\u201c Increased energy prices are a potent factor, as are the prices of refinery products that are crucial to industrial production and commercial transport,\u201d Mukherjee said.<\/p>\n<p>But he stressed that not all countries will experience the same rate of inflation.<\/p>\n<p>In richer developed countries, inflation is projected to rise from 2.6% in 2025 to 2.9% in 2026. In developing countries, inflation is forecast to accelerate from 4.2% to 5.2% as higher costs for energy, transportation and imported goods erode real incomes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":593378,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,1294,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-593377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=593377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593377\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/593378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=593377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=593377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=593377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}