BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, Jan. 11 (Xinhua) -- Brunei recorded an 85.5 percent year-on-year drop in trade surplus for October 2019 due to a jump in major imports.
Latest International Merchandise Trade Statistics released on Saturday by the Department of Economic Planning and Development (DEPD) at the Ministry of Finance and Economy showed that Brunei's trade balance for October 2019 decreased to 44.2 million Brunei dollars (32.8 million U.S. dollars) from 304.0 million Brunei dollars in October 2018.
This was largely due to an increase in imports valued at 725.4 million Brunei dollars from 551.4 million Brunei dollars, a 31.6 percent rise. Exports decreased in the time frame to 769.6 million Brunei dollars from 855.4 million Brunei dollars.
Mineral Fuels recorded the highest contribution of total exports (91.2 percent) with 702.2 million Brunei dollars.
"Major exports decreased by 8.9 percent in October 2019. This was mainly due to a decrease in the exports of liquefied natural gas by 26.7 percent. On the other hand, the exports of crude oil increased by 13.5 percent," said DEPD.
The highest share of exports in October 2019 went to Japan (41.4 percent), followed by Australia (17.2 percent), Thailand (16.4 percent) and the Republic of Korea (7.1 percent).
The highest share of imports in October 2019 came from the United Arab Emirates accounting for 14.5 percent, followed by Kazakhstan (12.8 percent), Singapore (11.4 percent) and Germany (11.3 percent).
