The B.C. Economic Forecast Council has improved its growth projections for B.C.'s economy in 2010 due to increases in housing starts and recent improvements in the mineral resources sector and commodity markets.
The Council now expects the economy to grow by 2.9% instead of 2.5% projected growth reported in the Ministry of Finance's September budget update.
The range of growth projections was between a low of 2.2% by Laurentian Bank Securities Chief Economist Carlos Leitao and a high of 4.2% by Marie-Christine Bernard, the Conference Board of Canada's associate director of provincial economic trends.
The 14-member council also forecast 2011 growth at an average 3.2%. The range was between a low of 2.2% by Central 1's Helmut Pastrick and Ernie Stokes and a high of 4.1% by CIBC's Warren Lovely and Bank of Montreal's Doug Porter forecasting 4.1% growth