South Korea's finance minister on Tuesday called for making all-out efforts to achieve its plan to pour out nearly half of its annual budget in the first quarter in order to pump-prime an economy struggling with faltering exports.

The government earlier said it will spend 144 trillion won ($116.6 billion) out of the 330.6 trillion won budget for 2016 in the first three months of the year, as key economic data showed that the country is facing some tough challenges, including a sharp downturn in oil prices and waning global demand, while domestic consumption remains in the doldrums.

Exports, the country's key economic driver, plunged 12.2 percent on-year in February after diving 18.8 percent in January from a year earlier, the largest on-year drop in more than six years.

Retail sales retreated 1.4 percent in January, compared to a 3 percent on-quarter gain in the fourth quarter of last year, due largely to a 28.1 percent slump in car sales.

"We still experience rising uncertainties at home and abroad, like a Chinese slowdown and a low oil price trend, despite slight improvements in some economic figures," Finance Minister Yoo Il-ho, who also doubles as the deputy prime minister for economic affairs, said in a Cabinet meeting in Seoul.

"I ask every minister to execute the frontloaded budget as scheduled during the remainder of the first quarter."

The government is planning to spend 35.2 trillion won in March alone, some 40.7 percent of the government expenditures earmarked for the January-March period.

He said the finance ministry will iron out any problems that hinder state authorities from spending money as planned. (Yonhap)