Qatar's economy grew 6.9 per cent year-on-year in inflation-adjusted terms in the first quarter of the year, helped by a jump in the construction industry, its statistics authority said.

The world's biggest exporter of liquefied natural gas also saw its real GDP rising by 3 per cent in January-March, compared with the previous three months, the Qatar Statistics Authority was quoted as saying by our sister publication the Gulf Daily News.

In March, it reported a GDP growth of 14.7 per cent year-on-year for October-December 2011 and revised it to 14.8 per cent in the following month. It also put the quarter-on-quarter expansion at 4.6 per cent in April.

Qatar expects its economic growth to slow to 4.5 per cent in 2013, the weakest rate in a decade, the state planning authority said earlier.

The weakening global growth outlook and the euro zone debt crisis pose a risk to the Opec member as they are affecting oil prices, it added.

Qatar saw GDP growth falling to 6.2 per cent in 2012 from a revised 14.1 per cent last year as the impact of decades of expansion in its gas output levels off.

Analysts in March forecast real GDP growth of 6.6 per cent for 2012.

Oil and gas output, which accounts for around 58 per cent of the economy, increased 4.6 per cent on an annual basis in constant prices in the first quarter, edging up 0.6 per cent quarter-on-quarter

Construction, where activity is picking up ahead of the 2022 World Cup soccer tournament, saw output rising 6.1 per cent year-on-year.