Spain grew at its slowest quarterly pace in nearly 13 years between January and March, as a tumbling housing market and the global credit crunch brought a sharp deceleration in economic activity.

The economy expanded by only 0.3 per cent in the first quarter, compared with 0.8 per cent in the last quarter of 2007, and 0.9 per cent in the first quarter of 2007, according to preliminary government data published yesterday. It was Spain’s lowest growth rate since the third quarter of 1995, when Spain was emerging from recession, the national statistics institute said.