Norway raises oil wealth spending to avert recession

Oslo

NORWAY'S government boosted the amount of oil money it will spend this year to a record, dipping deeper into its sovereign wealth fund to ward off a recession.

The government will use 205.6 billion Norwegian kroner (S$34.4 billion) of its oil wealth, up from the 195.2 billion kroner it estimated in October, according to the budget released in Oslo on Wednesday. The spending will have a stimulus effect of 1.1 percentage point, which is the most since 2009 and up from 0.7 percentage point in the initial budget.