EXPORTS GROW 5.4% FROM JAN-AUG 2012

Despite 9% contraction in August ‘12

MANILA—Merchandise exports for the first eight months of this year grew by 5.4 percent to US$35.3 billion from US$33.5 billion in the same period in 2011, despite the 9.0-percent decline for August 2012, according to the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA).

“The Philippines is among the few economies among selected Asian countries that registered positive exports growth in the first eight months of 2012,” said NEDA officer-in-charge (OIC) Emmanuel F. Esguerra.

Citing country data, Esguerra said the Philippines is next only to Vietnam and China, which posted 18.7-percent and 7.1-percent growths, respectively, for the said period. Other countries with positive growths were Japan (1.1%), Singapore (0.3%) and Hong Kong SAR (0.1%).

On the other hand, export contractions were experienced in Indonesia (-5.9%), Taiwan (-5.6%), Korea (-1.5%) and Thailand (-1.3%) from January to August 2012.

However, for August this year, the National Statistics Office (NSO) reported that merchandise exports from the Philippines declined by 9.0 percent to US$3.8 billion from US$4.2 billion in August 2011. This was due to lower overseas sales of minerals (-62.4%), total agro-based products (-43.7%), manufactures(-1.3%), petroleum (-99.7%), and forest products (-49.8%).

Earnings from minerals dipped, as revenues significantly declined for copper metal (-100%), gold (-88.5%) and chromium ore (-21.8%).  Also, in terms of volume, exports of copper metal, gold and chromium ore fell by 100 percent, 67.6 percent and 47.1 percent, respectively.

“This decline in volume of minerals owes mainly to reduced demand from China and Europe, which weighed down international market prices,” said Esguerra.

Likewise, total agro-based exports in August 2012 contracted year-on-year due to lower sales of coconut products which posted a 51.7 percent drop.

“Lower receipts from coconut oil (-50.5%) and desiccated coconut (-82.3%) greatly affected exports for coconut products. This can be attributed to both low volume of outward shipments and declining prices in the international market,” said Esguerra.

Meanwhile, overseas sales of manufactured goods slightly fell by 1.3 percent in August 2012, a turnaround from the sustained growth recorded since January 2012.

“The decline in the export of manufactured goods partly reflected the steeper-than-expected downturn in global manufacturing as a result of declining levels of new businesses and excess capacity,” he explained.

As for petroleum products, exports fell by 99.7 percent to US$83.1 thousand in August 2012 from US$24.5 million in the same month last year.

“Even with its negligible share in total export receipts during the month, the reduction of revenues from petroleum products pulled down merchandise exports by 0.58 percentage points,” the NEDA official said.

In terms of destination, Japan was the top market for Philippine exports in August 2012, accounting for 18.1 percent of total export receipts. Second is Singapore with a 14.8 percent share followed by the United States of America (13.1%), the People’s Republic of China (9.9%) and Hong Kong SAR (8.1%).

Esguerra, who is Deputy Director-General for Planning and Policy, is OIC of NEDA from October 10 to 12, 2012, while Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and NEDA Director-General Arsenio M. Balisacan is on official business abroad.

M.R. No. 2012-071

11 October 2012