The figure was in line with a flash estimate issued by the office earlier this month amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Investment decreased by 10.9 percent, private consumption fell 3.2 percent, and domestic demand went down by 3.4 percent in Poland in the fourth quarter of 2020, the Central Statistical Office reported.
The state-run statistics agency has previously reported that Polish GDP fell by 1.5 percent in the third quarter of last year, after shrinking 8.4 percent in the second quarter.
The Polish economy contracted by 2.8 percent in 2020 as a whole, according to an estimate released by the Central Statistical Office (GUS) last month.
Polish 2020 GDP contraction among mildest in EU
The European Commission has said that Poland’s economy went into a recession last year due to the coronavirus pandemic, but the contraction was among the mildest in the EU.
The EU executive predicted in its Winter 2021 European Economic Forecast that Poland’s GDP would grow 3.1 percent this year and expand by 5.1 percent in 2022.
Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said this month that Poland was among the European Union’s most financially stable economies, with a high level of fiscal stability and low risk in terms of public finances.
He also said that Poland has weathered the coronavirus storm in a better condition than some of Europe's wealthiest economies.
Morawiecki said in early February that, despite the coronavirus pandemic, Poland would not only avoid a recession this year, but enjoy a strong economic recovery, seeing its GDP grow by no less than 4 percent.
Poland's President Andrzej Duda last month signed the country’s budget for 2021, which expects the economy to grow 4 percent, with inflation targeted at 1.8 percent.
The Polish economy expanded by 4.5 percent in 2019, after registering 5.3 percent growth in 2018, according to the Central Statistical Office.
(gs/pk)
Source: PAP