Mamuju, W Sulawesi (ANTARA News) - The government has projected the domestic economy to expand by an average of 7 percent annually in the 2010-2014 period as envisaged in the second phase of medium-term development plan, an official said.

"The government will always make an effort to raise the national economic growth. In the 2005-2009 period or the first phase of medium-term development plan the economy expanded convincingly by an average of above 5 percent per year. Only in 2009 the economy grew 4.5 percent because of the global economic crisis," Dida Heryadi Salya, assistant for institutional affairs to the chief of the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas) said here on Wednesday.

With the economy growing at a promising pace, the government managed to keep down unemployment rate to 7.87 percent in 2009 from 11.24 percent in 2005, he said.

The poverty rate also fell to 14.15 percent in 2009 from 15.97 percent in 2005, he said.

"We must always be optimistic about the prospect of the national economy. We have set the target of the economic growth rate for 2014 at a range of 7.0- 7.7 percent," he said.

Likewise, the unemployment rate was expected to fall to 6.0-6.6 percent and poverty rate 8-10 percent in 2014, he said. (T.S012/O001)