JAKARTA: Indonesia registered a trade surplus of US$1.65 billion in the first quarter of this year, amid a 14-percent cumulative year-on-year (YoY) decline in exports to $33.59 billion. The surplus came predominantly from the non-oil and gas sector, which had a trade value of $2.07 billion.
Oil and gas exports in the first quarter of the year slumped 39.5 percent (YoY) to $3.45 billion, while non-oil and gas exports decreased 9.6 percent to $30.14 billion, according to Central Statistics Agency (BPS).
“January 2016 was the lowest point for exports. In the recent two months, February and March, there were slight increases,” said BPS head Suryamin on Friday in Jakarta.
In volume, the oil and gas exports actually increased 1.85 percent (YoY) from 131.4 million ton in Q1/2015 to 120.2 million ton in Q1/2016. However, the selling prices dropped by 39.3 percent (YoY) from $513 to $311.7 per ton.
Meanwhile, the export volume of non-oil and gas commodities decreased 9.5 percent (YoY) from 120.6 to 109.2 million tons. The aggregate price, however, rose 4.14 percent from $262.7 to $273.6 per ton.
Along with the drop in exports, the January-March imports decreased as well, by 13 percent, to $31.9 billion. Both oil-and-gas imports as well as non-oil-and-gas imports decreased 36.5 and 8.4 percent respectively.
“Non-oil and gas imports have fallen after local manufacturers started producing goods that substituted the imported ones. We can see it from the decline in capital goods imports by 18.2 percent to $5.3 billion,” Suryamin said.
