April exports grow by 0.8%

MANILA, Philippines - The country's merchandise exports stood at $4.544 billion in April 2014, managing a slight growth of 0.8 percent from the previous year's $4.506 billion, the Philippine Statistical Authority (PSA) announced on Tuesday.

"The positive growth was mainly brought about by the increase of six major commodities out of the top ten commodities for the month. These are: processed food and beverages; other mineral products; machinery and transport equipment; ignition wiring set and other wiring sets used in vehicles, aircrafts and ships; articles of apparel and clothing accessories; and woodcrafts and furniture," the state agency said. Total exports from the first four months of the year amounted to $18.859 billion, higher by 5.4 percent from the $17.894 billion posted the same period last year.

PSA said electronic products remained as the country's top export with an $1.817-billion or 40-percent share in the total export revenues in April 2014. This was followed by other manufactures, woodcrafts and furniture, other mineral products, and machinery and transport equipment.

"This slower export growth is not expected to persist in the long-term. Overall, the gradual recovery of the global economy continues to firm up as demand from the Philippines’s other major export markets picked up strongly in April 2014 particularly for Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, Germany, Taiwan and the Netherlands,” said Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Arsenio Balisacan.

Japan remained as the country's top export destination, with a $939.16-billion revenue accounting for 20.7 percent of the total. This was followed by the United States of America (16.2 percent), China (12.6 percent), Singapore (8.3 percent) and Hong Kong (8.1 percent).

Exports to East Asia accounted for 49.4 percent of the total, followed by the Association od Southeast Asian Nations (17 percent) and the European Union (11.1 percent).