Agri trade gap widens
The imbalance between the country’s agricultural imports and exports further widened during the first quarter of the year as the Philippines continued to outsource rather than produce certain agricultural items. Based on a Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) report, total agricultural trade in the first quarter hit $4.4 billion, down 11.7 percent from $5.06 billion a year ago. The decline was faster than the annual drop in the previous quarter of 0.5 percent.Total agricultural exports hit only $1.61 billion while imports amounted to $2.79 billion, which translated to a trade deficit of $1.18 billion.
The country’s top 10 commodity exports, which accounted for $1.54 billion, or 96 percent of the total, included edible fruit and nuts, peel of citrus melons and animal or vegetable fats and oils and their cleavage products.
Of that figure, $153 million worth of products were traded with other Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries, with Malaysia as the Philippines’ top export market in the region. In the European Union, the Netherlands was the country’s major market for agricultural products.
The PSA report also showed that cereals—which included rice—were the country’s top agricultural imports in the first quarter, accounting for $573 million. This is equivalent to 20.5 percent of the total.Vietnam, where the country sources most of its imported rice, was the biggest source of the Philippines’ agricultural imports in the Asean, accounting for 27 percent of the agricultural imports from the region. Aside from cereals, other imported agricultural goods from Asean were miscellaneous edible preparations and animal or vegetable fats and oils and their cleavage products.In the European Union, the Netherlands was the country’s top supplier of agricultural goods worth $66.53 million, or 22.3 percent of the total imports from the EU. Nonetheless, thePSA noted that the country’s agricultural imports decreased by 19 percent during the quarter from $3.44 billion in the same period last year. —KARL R. OCAMPO INQ
