Economic Growth in Japan Stalls : Finance: Gross national product for 1992 was 1.5%, the lowest in 18 years. Excluding quarterly income from overseas, economy has shrunk.

While Japanese companies continue to announce staff cutbacks and sharp earnings declines, the government released figures Friday confirming that the country’s economic growth has nearly come to a complete stop.

Japan’s gross national product, the total output of goods and services, grew by just 0.1% in the last three months of 1992, holding growth for the year to 1.5%, the lowest in 18 years. When income from overseas is excluded, Japan’s economy actually shrunk for three quarters in a row for the first time since the end of World War II.

Economic Planning Agency Vice Minister Shunji Fukinbara said that the government’s target of 1.6% GNP growth in the fiscal year ending March 31 will likely not be met. The agency only recently revised its target downward from 3.5%.

“The economy seems to be crawling along the bottom,” Fukinbara said.

And the usually upbeat agency said the Japanese economy may have more hard times ahead before the numbers improve.

The grim economic news could put additional pressure on the Japanese government to move ahead with plans for an income tax cut to spur domestic consumer demand.

Meanwhile, Japanese corporations continue to suffer downward revisions in their earnings forecasts. Computer maker Fujitsu Ltd. announced Friday that it will be in the red to the tune of $120 million in the year ending March 31. It had previously projected $160 million in profit for the fiscal year.

It would be the first loss for Fujitsu since it was listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1949. The company is suffering from weak computer sales as well as high interest expenses on borrowing for its 1990 purchase of British computer maker ICL.

While most recent news has been grim, some economists are beginning to see signs of an upturn.

NEC Corp. and Matsushita Electric both recently announced plans to go ahead with the construction of new semiconductor facilities to meet sharply increased demand for memory chips. And separate surveys by the Bank of Japan and the business daily Nihon Keizai Shimbun project an upturn in corporate profit in 1993 after an average 25% drop in earnings in the current fiscal year.