Indonesia's trade balance back to surplus with plunging imports
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Topics: INDONESIA
The National Agency of Statistics on Monday announced that Indonesia's trade balance swung to a 2.09 billion U.S. dollar surplus in May from a 350 million U.S. dollar deficit in April.
Imports plunged by 42.2 percent to 8.44 billion U.S. dollars in May annualized, and exports tumbled by 28.95 percent to 10.53 billion U.S. dollars in the month on the yearly basis, Head of the National Agency of Statistics Kecuk Suhariyanto noted.
"The surplus occurred amid falling exports and plunging imports," he said.
Imports of capital goods drifted down to 1.39 billion U.S. dollars in May from 2.32 billion U.S. dollars in the same period last year, and the shipments of raw materials from abroad edged down to 6.11 billion U.S. dollars in May from 10.73 billion U.S. dollars in the same period last year, Suhariyanto added.
The global economic fallout from the virus pandemic has depressed demands and cut prices of commodities.
The partial lockdown along with the physical distancing has cast millions of people cooped up for months and restricted their mobility, disrupting chain supplies of goods which nearly paralyzed the economy. ■