Singapore non-oil exports stabilizing but still weak

Asian Economic News, June 24, 2002

SINGAPORE, June 18 Kyodo

Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) remained weak in May, falling 6.8% on a year-on-year basis after growing almost as much last month, according to official trade data released Monday.

''Apart from weaker performance in NODX of both electronics and non-electronics, this poorer showing...was also caused in part by the high base in the same period last year,'' said International Enterprise Singapore, the national trade promotion agency.

Exports to Singapore's biggest market for NODX, the United States, fell 3.8% to S$1.8 billion (about US$1.01 billion) with domestic exports of both electronics and non-electronics products remaining lackluster.

''Weakness continued to persist in most electronics products, such as disk drives, parts of personal computers and integrated circuits'' while ''domestic exports of non-electronics to the U.S. were dragged down largely by the poor performance of pharmaceuticals.''

However, the agency noted that on a three-month moving average basis, NODX to the U.S. contracted by a more moderate 9.1% in May, which marks the first single-digit decline since April last year.

Shipments to other top markets were mixed. Exports to the European Union contracted by 33% to S$1.1 billion, exports to Japan fell 21% S$734 million while exports to neighboring Malaysia dipped 2% to S$1.02 billion.

Overall, the island republic's total trade grew marginally by 0.4% to S$36 billion, with exports up 0.6% to S$18.6 billion and imports rising 1.4% to S$17.4 billion.