SEOUL, Dec. 26 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's public sector debt, including the debt of the general government and the state-funded non-financial public corporations, grew faster last year, the finance ministry said Thursday.
The public sector debt, called D3, amounted to 1,078.0 trillion won (928.2 billion U.S. dollars) as of the end of 2018, up 33.4 trillion won (28.8 billion U.S. dollars) from a year earlier, according to the Ministry of Economy and Finance.
It was faster than an 8.0 trillion-won (6.9 billion U.S. dollars) increase in 2017. The public sector debt expanded 33.1 trillion won (28.5 billion U.S. dollars) in 2016.
The ratio of public sector debt to the gross domestic product (GDP) stood at 56.9 percent as of the end of last year, unchanged from a year earlier.
After peaking at 61.3 percent in 2014, the ratio continued to fall to 60.5 percent in 2015 and 59.5 percent in 2016, respectively.
The general government debt, dubbed D2, increased 24.5 trillion won (21.1 billion U.S. dollars) to 759.7 trillion won (654.1 billion U.S. dollars) in the cited period. The D2 includes the debts of the central and provincial governments and the nonprofit public institutions.
The ratio of general government debt to the GDP was unchanged at 40.1 percent as of end-2018 compared with a year earlier. The figure was 41.2 percent as of the end of 2016.
The 2018 debt-to-GDP ratio was much lower than an average reading of 109.2 percent among members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
