Exports down yet again but cause for optimism
Thailand’s exports contracted 2.15 per cent year on year to US$21.409 billion in June, due mainly to the impact of the US-China trade war, according to the Director of the Trade Policy and Strategy Office, Pimchanok Vonkorpon.
It was the fourth straight month of reduced exports but the figures suggested a relative uptick, compared with the 6.2 per cent contraction in May, she said.
However, if gold and oil-related products were taken out of the equation, June exports would show a much higher contraction of 8 per cent, due to the high value of gold exports.
Imports in June were US$18.197 billion, down 9.4 per cent year on year, resulting in an overall trade surplus of US$3.212 billion.
In January-June 2019 the value of Thailand’s exports stood at US$122.971 billion, down 2.9 per cent on the first six months of 2018, while imports were valued at US$119.027 billion, down 2.41 per cent year on year.
If Thailand’s exports can reach an average of US$21 billion per month for the rest of the year, the country still has a chance of seeing an overall expansion in exports of between one per cent and two per cent in 2019 – and Pimchanok does expect exports to rise in the last quarter of the year.
In June Thailand’s exports were down across the board to its major trading partners: 2.1 per cent to the US, 14.9 per cent to China, 1.9 per cent to Japan and a whopping 7.7 per cent to the European Union.
