English
Indonesia: Indonesia’s December exports beat forecast, but full-year shrinks again
JAKARTA: Indonesia’s exports rose faster than expected in December onstronger commodities prices, helping to narrow the pace of decline in full-year trade for the resource-dependent economy.
Shipments from South-East Asia’s largest economy in 2016 were worth US$144.4bil.
This was down 3.95% from a year earlier, data from the statistics bureau showed yesterday, slower than the 14.6% decline recorded in 2015.
Exports in December rose 15.57% from a year earlier to produce the biggest earnings in 24 months.
The country saw the first annual increase in exports in nearly two years in August.
Exports then continued to grow on a yearly basis every month in the final quarter of 2016.
“It is worth noting that although we posted a surplus, our exports were still lower than 2015 and imports too.
“This means we have not fully recovered and that recovery takes time,” Suhariyanto, the head of the statistics bureau, told reporters.
Indonesia, a big commodities exporter, has been struggling amid weak prices for oil and gas as well as palm oil and coal, among other resources. Total exports, which peaked at US$203.5bil in 2011, have been falling in each of the past five years.
In 2016, Indonesia’s shipments of oil and gas were particularly weak as they tumbled nearly 30% in value.
The country also earned less from overseas sales of coal, palm oil, coffee and cocoa, among other key commodities, but its exports of manufactured goods rose 1.07%.
Meanwhile, Indonesia’s total imports last year were US$135.7bil, down 4.94% from 2015. A steeper decline in imports helped the country to post a trade surplus of US$8.8bil, larger than the US$7.7bil in 2015.
ANZ’s economist Weiwen Ng said incoming US President Donald Trump’s “stimulative fiscal policy will underpin commodity prices”, adding that Indonesia may benefit.
Ahead of the trade data, ANZ said Indonesia, along with some other emerging economies in Asia, “are emerging from a trade recession which had plagued the region since late 2014”.
It argued that a low comparative base from the previous year for Asia’s export prices will continue to drive overall export growth in the first half of this year.
Indonesia’s deputy head of the statistics bureau, Sasmito Hadi Wibowo, said the government’s recent policy change on mineral exports will likely help accelerate export growth this year.
“But the main point is 2016 should be the lowest, the bottom of the trough, and I hope they (exports) rise in 2017,” Wibowo said.
Weak trade performance was one of the reasons Indonesia’s economic growth was 5.02% in the third quarter, slower than markets had expected. — Reuters
Growth is expected to stay around that level in the final three months of last year, bringing 2016 GDP to 5 %, according to government forecast.
The economy is expected to grow 5.1 % this year.— Reuters
Source: http://www.thestar.com.my/business/business-news/2017/01/17/indonesias-december-exports-beat-forecast-but-fullyear-shrinks-again/