Domestic trade grew by 0.4% in 2019

MANILA, Philippines — Domestic trade grew marginally in terms of volume and contracted in terms of value in 2019, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said yesterday.

Final results of the 2019 Highlights of the Domestic Trade Statistics in the Philippines showed that the total volume of domestic trade grew slightly by 0.4 percent to 25.89 million tons from 25.78 million tons a year ago.

The growth in volume was driven by shipments of food and live animals; manufactured goods; and mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials.

The total value of traded goods within the country, however, contracted by 2.9 percent to P834.72 billion in 2019 from P859.57 billion in 2018.

Machinery and transport equipment led in terms of value of traded commodities, followed by food and live animals and manufactured goods.

Only three regions registered a positive trade balance in 2019, with growth in outflow value outpacing inflow value.

These were National Capital Region (NCR), P198.11 billion; Eastern Visayas, P37.27 billion; and Central Luzon.

The rest of the regions in the country had negative trade balances, but the largest unfavorable trade balance – inflow value outpacing output value – was seen in CARAGA region at P110.3 billion.

PSA’s commodity flow statistics is a compilation of data on commodities transported through air and water only. In the Philippines, 99.9 percent of commodities are transported via water with the remaining 0.1 percent through air transport.

The agency compiles domestic trade statistics from coasting manifests and coastwise passenger manifests from major ports and other active seaports listed by the Philippine Ports of Authority nationwide.

Also collected are air waybills from domestic airlines in the country as source of domestic trade statistics from air transport.