South Korea's electricity demand rose more than 7 percent in May from a year earlier amid a gradual economic recovery, data showed Wednesday.

The country's maximum power demand averaged 63,388 megawatts (MW) last month, up 7.3 percent from a year earlier, according to the data from the Electric Power Statistics Information System.

The May tally was down a mere 0.5 percentage point from May 2019, meaning power demand in Asia's fourth-largest economy has almost recovered to pre-pandemic levels.

May also represents the seventh consecutive month of an on-year increase.

The solid gain in May comes as South Korea's economic recovery has shown signs of gaining pace, helped by a strong rebound in exports.

Exports, which account for about half of the nation's gross domestic production, soared 45.6 percent on-year in May due to strong demand for chips amid the global economic recovery, following a 41.1 percent jump in April.

On the back of the economic recovery, South Korea's electricity consumption has actually shown an uptrend since November last year. According to the state-run Korea Electric Power Corp., South Korea's electricity sales posted the fifth consecutive month of increase in March.

Industry watchers predicted South Korea's electricity demand to grow further in the second half of the year as the country's economic growth is likely to gather more ground. (Yonhap)