XN000022-1997-02-28 — Page 16

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External trade figures for January 1997

In January 1997, the value of Hong Kong's re-exports and imports showed only marginal increases over a year earlier. Domestic exports continued to decline on a year-on-year basis.

These are shown in the external trade figures for January 1997 released today (Friday) by the Census and Statistics Department.

The value of total exports (comprising re-exports and domestic exports) in January 1997 decreased by 0.7% over a year earlier to $119.4 billion. Within total exports, the value of re-exports increased by 0.9% to $102.1 billion, but the value of domestic exports decreased by 9.1% to $17.3 billion.

The value of imports increased by 1.1% in January 1997 over a year earlier to $131.8 billion.

As the value of total exports in January 1997 was smaller than that of total imports, a visible trade deficit of $12.4 billion, equivalent to 9.4% of the value of imports, was recorded. The corresponding visible trade deficit in January 1996 was $10.1 billion, equivalent to 7.7% of the value of imports.

Commenting on the latest trade performance, a Government spokesman said that trade figures usually displayed greater volatility in the first two months of each year. The small growth in both imports and re-exports in January 1997 was likely to have been affected by the different timing of the Lunar New Year Holidays in 1996 and 1997 and the high base of comparison resulting from the strong growth in external trade in January 1996. Thus it should be more meaningful to make comparison based on the figures for January and February combined, when the latter figures become available towards the end of next month.

The table presents the external trade figures in January 1997.

A more detailed analysis of Hong Kong's external trade for January 1997, by commodity and country/territory, will be released in mid-March 1997.