By Nick Mann | 19 March 2012

Gross domestic product growth in the Group of 20 countries slowed to 0.7% in the final three months of 2011, according to figures published last week by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

The provisional aggregate figure for October to December compares with 0.9% growth recorded for the previous quarter and is the slowest quarterly growth rate since the second quarter of 2009.

It means for 2011 as a whole the GDP of the leading nations increased by 2.8%, which the OECD said was a ‘marked deceleration’ from the 5% in 2010.

GDP trends varied between the world’s largest economies in the final quarter of 2011, the OECD said. The US economy grew by 0.7%, compared with 0.5% over the previous three months, while China’s growth rate slowed, from 2.3% between July and September to 2% between October and December.

The economies of both the European Union as a whole and the eurozone shrank by 0.3% while GDP in the UK and Japan fell by 0.2%.

Indonesia recorded the strongest figure among the G20 nations, with growth of 2.1%. India’s GDP grew by 1.8% growth rate, compared with 0.9% the previous quarter.

Last week's data is the first release of an aggregate growth figure for the G20 as part of the Data Gaps Initiative, a process agreed by G20 finance ministers and central bank governors to improve gaps in data highlighted by the economic crisis.