SEOUL: South Korea’s deficit in the fruit trade with the United States has been growing every year after the bilateral free trade agreement went into effect in 2012, a report said Wednesday.
Statistics provided in the report from the Korea Rural Economic Institute (KERI) showed South Korea imported US$631 million worth of fruits from the U.S. in 2017, up 13.5 percent from the previous year. The latest figure marks a jump of 140.1 percent from the pre-FTA yearly average of $263 million won between 2007 and 2011.
The volume of imports also increased from an average 149,407 tons before the FTA to 240,915 tons last year.
When including vegetables, South Korea’s imports from the U.S. amounted to $698 million in 2017.
Exports of fruits and vegetables to the U.S. totaled $87 million last year, an increase of 7.8 percent from the previous year and up 51 percent from before the FTA implementation, but the sum falls far behind the increase in imports, the report pointed out.
The trend resulted in a trade deficit of $544 million for the South Korean side in fruits and vegetables, doubling from $270 million before the FTA.
The U.S. Trade Representative in March released a report on trade barriers against American goods, which cited pending market access requests to South Korea for blueberries from states other than Oregon, a wider market for cherries, and opening for U.S. apples and pears.
KERI’s report showed that imports of U.S. cherries had increased 385.2 percent to $145 million last year from an average $30 million before the trade pact.
