Romania recorded the highest economic growth in the European Union (EU) in the third quarter of this year, showed preliminary estimates released on Thursday by EU's statistical office Eurostat. Romania's third quarter gross domestic product (GDP) was 1.6 percent higher than in the previous three months, according to Eurostat, followed by Latvia, Britain, Hungary, Poland and Bulgaria. Compared with the same quarter of 2012, Romania's economic growth was up 4.1 percent, also the most significant growth recorded in the eurozone and the EU. Romania is followed by Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Eurostat's GDP data about Romania correspond with those announced by the country's National Institute of Statistics. The Romanian government expected its economy to grow by 2.2 percent for the year of 2013. During the global economic crisis in 2009, Romania's GDP fell sharply to minus 6.6 percent from 7.3-percent growth in the previous year. The country started to recover from 2011 and achieved a growth of 2.2 percent. Last year, the Romanian economy grew by 0.7 percent.