The Philippines trailed behind its Asean-5 neighbors on the list of top world exporters and importers, World Trade Organization (WTO) data showed.
In its World Statistical Trade Review for 2017, data from the Switzerland-based WTO ranked the Philippines 30th in terms of merchandise exports and 24th in terms of merchandise imports.
“On the imports side, falling fuel prices continued to weigh down the value of its imports in 2016. Developed economies in Asia registered growth in exports value terms of 3 percent in 2016, following a decline of 13 percent in 2015, largely driven by a recovery of Japan’s exports,” the WTO said.
The WTO estimated the Philippines’s exports amounted to $56 billion in 2016, or 0.4 percent of global merchandise exports. It posted a decline of 4 percent from 2015.
In terms of merchandise imports, the WTO estimated that the Philippines’s import bill reached $86 billion, or 0.7 percent of global imports in 2016.
This represented a growth of 23 percent, the highest growth in global imports and the only double-digit recorded among 50 countries included by the WTO in the rankings.
However, Asean-5 countries were led by Singapore in terms of export earnings and import bill. Singapore ranked ninth among the world’s exporters and 10th among importers.
Thailand was ranked 15th and 16th in terms of exports and imports, respectively, while Malaysia ranked 17th and 19th in exports and imports.
Vietnam and Indonesia ranked 19th and 21st among the world’s exporters and 18th and 22nd in terms of imports, respectively.
Based on data from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the country’s total trade in goods in 2016 was recorded at $141.514 billion, expanding by 8.9 percent, from $129.894 billion in 2015.
This translated into a wider balance of trade in goods deficit at $26.702 billion in 2016, higher than the $12.240 billion recorded in 2015.
3 comments
Hi Ms. Cai, could I please get the link of the WTO statistics source you used for this article? or specifically what file in WTO you used for this? thank you!