Higher business inventories has helped the economy grow

Japan's gross domestic product - a measure of economic growth - rose 0.1% over the period, beating government forecasts of a 0.1% shrinkage.

In the previous two quarters, the economy declined by 0.3%, conforming to the standard definition of a recession: two consecutive quarters of decline.

Economists pointed out that the figure still represented almost flat growth.

Inventories rise

"Although October-December turned out to be a small expansion quarter, and it certainly looks better than the initial estimate..[it] does not change that much," Osamu Tanaka, an economist at Morgan Stanley, told Reuters.

The most positive contribution to the increased growth seemed to come from Japanese businesses building up inventories.

On an annualised basis, Japan's GDP rose 0.5%.

This compared with an initial government estimate of a 0.5% drop and economists' forecasts of a 0.6% decline.