KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's exports in July contracted 13.1% to RM116.75bil, mainly owing to the decrease in shipments to Asean markets from a year before.
Despite the lower exports, the country's trade surplus remained on an uptrend, growing 7.9% year-on-year (y-o-y) to RM17.09bil as the value of imports fell 15.9% to RM99.66bil.
With the decrease in shipment values, Malaysia's total trade value was down 14.4% to RM216.41bil.
"The performance was similar to other regional markets notably Indonesia, China, Taiwan and the Republic of Korea (ROK) which recorded negative trade growth for July 2023," said the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry (Miti) in a statement.
For the January to July period, Malaysia's exports were down 5.9% to RM820bil while imports fell 6.5% to RM684.65bil.
The trade surplus during the period was 2.5% lower compared to the same period in 2022 to RM135.35bil
According to Miti, Malaysia's exports of manufactured goods in July, comprising the bulk of all exports, narrowed 9.8% y-o-y to RM101.25bil due to lower demand for petroleum products, palm-oil based manufactured products as well as machinery. equipment and parts.
However, exports of electrical and electronics (E&E) products recorded positive growth.
Shipments of agriculture products in July were down 28.1% to RM7.56bil compared to July 2022 on the back of lower exports of palm oil and palm oil-based agriculture products, affected significantly by the weaker export prices of the commodity.
Meanwhile, the exports of mining goods in July dropped 33.6% y-o-y to RM7.34bil on slower exports of liquiefied natural gas (LNG) and crude petroleum.
By region, trade with Asean markets in July fell 17% y-o-y, the most among its major trading partners.
Exports to leading Asean market Singapore dove 19.7% to RM17.81bil, while exports to most other regional destinations recorded double-digit declines.
The exceptions were exports to Myanmar, which surged 62.1% to RM275mil, while shipments to Vietnam rose 0.2% to RM4.35bil and Laos rose 9.9% to RM9.8mil.
Exports to China, Malaysia's largest trading partner, rebounded 6.1% to RM16.8bil in July due to the strong shipments of E&E products, petroleum products and paper and pulp products.
However, total trade with the People's Republic fell 8.4% y-o-y to RM37.13bil.
As for the US, exports in July improved 2.2% to RM13.59bil but total trade slipped 6.7% to RM21.27bil.
For imports, deliveries of intermediate goods decreased 20.9% y-o-y to RM48.89bil following the lower imports of parts and accessories for non-transport capital goods.
Deliveries of capital goods shrank 3.6% to RM10.53bil on lower imports of industrial transport equipment, while consumption goods rose 5.9% to RM9.01bil on higher imports of processed food and beverages, mainly for household consumption.
