The presidential office has hailed the nation’s economic performance last year as top notch in response to the Bank of Korea’s(BOK) report released earlier on Tuesday. 

Spokesperson Kang Min-seok said in a written briefing that the negative one percent growth in gross domestic product(GDP) in 2020 stands out as a leading performance compared to the estimated contraction of three to ten percent of the top ten economies.

He also added that Korea's economic growth rate exceeded the estimates of leading agencies at home and abroad as well as market expectations.

Kang then pointed to foreign media reports predicting that South Korea's per capita GDP is likely to overtake one of the Group of Seven nations.

He asked the people to see this as a valuable achievement made by the public’s sacrifices during three waves of the pandemic.