SINGAPORE, April 4: Global economic growth should range between five and seven per cent even if the Us economy slows, India’s minister of commerce and industry said on Friday.

“I still feel global economic growth will be in the region of five per cent even if China goes down and even if India goes down a little bit,” Kamal Nath told reporters during a visit to Singapore.

“Economic growth, global economic growth, will grow by five to seven per cent, despite what’s happening in the United States.”

US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke said on Wednesday that the US economy could slide into a recession during the first half of 2008.

The International Monetary Fund is next week set to cut a half point off its 2008 forecast for global economic growth to 3.7 per cent, the fund’s managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn has said.—AFP