South Korea's public sector debt rose slightly in 2017 from a year earlier, but the ratio of debt to the country's gross domestic product fell, the government said Thursday.
The country's public sector debt -- which includes the debt of the central government and nonfinancial public firms -- reached 1,044.6 trillion won ($931 billion) as of end-2017, up 8 trillion won from 2016, according to the data compiled by the Ministry of Economy and Finance.
(Yonhap)
The public sector debt amounted to 60.4 percent of the country's GDP last year, compared with 63.1 percent in 2016.
The ministry said general government debt -- which covers the central and provincial governments and nonprofit public institutions -- stood at 735.2 trillion won, up from 717.5 trillion won a year earlier. Still, its amount in relation to the GDP fell 1.2 percentage points to 42.5 percent in 2017.
Meanwhile, national debt totaled 660.2 trillion won last year, reaching 38.2 percent of the GDP.
Nonfinancial public companies' debt fell 7.9 trillion won to 378.5 trillion won last year, with its GDP ratio losing 1.6 percentage points to 21.9 percent.
The ministry said nonfinancial public companies' debt has been on the decline since 2015 due to efforts to slash debt.
In terms of general government debt, South Korea had the eighth most favorable amount as measured in the debt-to-GDP ratio among 29 out of 36 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the ministry said.
The general government debt-to-GDP ratio in Japan and Canada stood at 233.2 percent and 110.3 percent, respectively. (Yonhap)
