TRADE DEFICIT NG PINAS LUMIIT ($2.48-B noong Dec. 2019)

NUMIPIS ang Philippine trade gap noong December 2019 nang mahigitan ng exports ang imports sa nasabing panahon, ayon sa Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

Sa datos ng PSA, ang balance of trade in goods (BoT-G) ng bansa ay nagtala ng $2.48-billion deficit, mas maliit ng 40.6% sa $4.17-billion noong December 2018.

“External trade — the total value of import and export receipts — in December amounted to $13.96 billion, 2.4% higher than the $13.63 billion the same month in 2018,” ayon sa PSA.

Ang export shipments ay tumaas ng 21.4% sa $5.74 billion mula sa $4.73 billion, dahil sa pagtaas sa siyam sa top 10 major export commodities.

“Increases were seen in cathodes and sections of cathodes, of refined copper (471.2%); fresh bananas (34.9%); gold (30.2%); electronic products (24.9%); chemicals (18.2%); and machinery and transport equipment (12.6%).”

Iniulat din ang pagtaas sa iba pang manufactured goods (10.4%); ignition wiring set at iba pang wiring sets na ginagamit sa mga sasakyan, aircraft at ships (3.5%); at coconut oil (1.1%).

Samantala, bumagsak ang imports ng 7.6% sa $8.22 billion mula sa $8.90 billion noong December 2018 dahil sa pagbaba sa pito sa top 10 major import commodities.

Ang mga ito ay ang iron and steel (-38.0%);  cereals and cereal preparations (-30.8%); industrial machinery and equipment (-21.9%); plastics in primary and non-primary forms (-21.5%);  other food and live animals (-11.5%); electronic products (-7.1%); at transport equipment (-1.2%).

“For the first quarter of 2020, we expect the trade gap to be substantially smaller as net trade drop on the back of supply chain disruptions from the nCoV epidemic to reflect a general slowdown in activity,” wika ni Robert Dan Roces, chief economist sa Security Bank Corp.