Canada’s national net worth increased 1.4% in the first three months of this year to $4.6 trillion, or almost $141,000 per person, Statistics Canada reported today.

The increase in the total net worth of households, corporations and governments was slower than the average of 1.7% in the previous 10 quarters, the agency said, as the national savings rate slipped.

Savings grew in the personal sector, due largely to rising home values and record stock-market prices, but slowed for governments and corporations.

Overall growth in national wealth decelerated to 0.9% in the quarter, with more than half of this increase resulting from the increase in residential real estate assets.

Meanwhile, Canadians’ net indebtedness to foreigners declined. Liabilities to non-residents increased, largely due to the rising value of foreign holdings of Canadian stocks, but this was outpaced by growth in Canadian portfolio assets abroad.

The country’s per-capita net worth of $140,800 was up 4.8% from a year earlier.

The personal savings rate was 1.9% for the quarter, up from 1.2% for all of 2005.

Personal debt grew almost as fast as the increase in assets, leaving households owing $1.08 for every dollar of disposable income, down marginally from the fourth quarter.

Thanks to the rise in asset values, the ratio of household debt to net worth declined to 17.7%.

Corporations, meanwhile, increased their reliance on borrowed money, moderating a downward trend in corporate leverage that has been in place since 1991, Statistics Canada said. Non-financial corporations had 59 cents of debt for every dollar of equity at the end of the first quarter.

In the government sector, net borrowing extended its downward trend, leaving the ratio of public debt to gross domestic product at a 20-year low of 47.2%.