Electronics remain top PH export

Electronic products remained the country’s top export in October, accounting for 43 percent of the country’s total export revenue for the month, according to the Semiconductor and Electronics Industries in the Philippines Inc. (Seipi).

Seipi president Dan Lachica reported that the exports of electronic products rose by 13.4 percent to $2.158 billion in October this year, from the $1.903 billion recorded in the same month last year.

Compared to the previous month, electronics exports similarly inched up by 0.4 percent from $2.15 billion.

“The positive growth was mainly brought by the increase of three electronics products and these are automotive electronics, consumer electronics and office equipment. The average foreign exchange rate for October dropped by 0.64 centavos favoring the US dollar at $1:P43.1825, and there was also an increase in the book-to-bill ratio of Japan and the US, which are top exports destination of the country,” Lachica explained.

On a year-to-date basis, however, cumulative exports of electronic products fell by 7.7 percent to $17.971 billion from January to October 2013, compared to the $19.474 billion posted a year ago.

Lachica attributed the decline to the “low pick-up of industry exports against the first half of 2013.”

As of end-October this year, the country’s top five export markets—comprising 64.61 percent of total revenues—were Hong Kong, China, Japan, United States, and Singapore. Other top markets were Germany, Taiwan, Republic of Korea, Netherlands and Thailand.

Seipi earlier announced that it expected the country’s electronics exports to contract by 10 to 12 percent this year, driven largely by a weakness in global demand, specifically for semiconductors.

While double-digit growth is seen in the automotive and consumer electronics sectors, weakness in semiconductors, which comprised 76 percent of the industry export, drove the contraction.

Lachica earlier said that the organization’s board decided to reduce its projections this year from the original target of a 5-percent growth, due also to dropping prices amid rising export volumes.  Amy R. Remo