GENEVA - SPURRED by a shift to more high value-added manufacturing and exports, Singapore's resilient economy will grow by 7.2 per cent this year, outpacing many other economies in the region, a United Nations (UN) report predicts.

Overall, East Asia, heavily influenced by the powerhouse Chinese economy, is expected to grow by 7.7 per cent, outpacing by a wide margin the rate of 3.4 per cent forecast for the world.

The UN, in its baseline scenario, also expects world trade to expand by 7.1 per cent, down from last year's 7.2 per cent.

The UN's flagship forecast, Economic Situation And Prospects, 2008, released simultaneously in Geneva and New York, also estimates that Indonesia's economy will grow by 6 per cent this year; Malaysia, 5.8 per cent; Thailand, 4.8 per cent; the Philippines, 6.1 per cent; and Taiwan, 4.4 per cent.

The UN warns, however, that there is a risk a deeper housing slump in the United States, coupled with a steep and accelerated fall of the US dollar, could 'trigger a worldwide recession and disorderly adjustment of the global imbalance'.

Read the full report in Monday's edition of The Straits Times.