Indonesia booked further record-high export and trade surpluses in October, bolstered once more by high coal and crude palm oil (CPO) prices, benefiting from a recovery in global trade. Statistics Indonesia (BPS) reported on Monday (Nov 15) that exports grew by 53.35 per cent year-on-year (yoy) to US$22.03 billion in October. Similarly, imports rose by 51.06 per cent to $16.29 billion from a year earlier. This brought the trade surplus to stand at $5.73 billion in October, marking an increase of 60.06 per cent from a year earlier. “The largest contributor to the increase in exports is coal exports, followed by CPO and iron and steel,” BPS head Margo Yuwono said in a virtual press briefing. “Export volumes for these commodities also rose, meaning there was a rise in demand from our export destination countries.” Indonesia has seen surging exports that have led to record-breaking trade surpluses several times during the pandemic, in part because of rising demand from major trading partners that have reemerged from lockdowns. Mining exports, which accounted for one-fifth of overall exports, posted the fastest growth at 190.57 per cent yoy to $4.53 billion, in line with high commodity prices, especially coal.
This was followed by oil and gas and manufacturing. Mineral fuels led the monthly increase at $823.3 million. This was followed by animal and vegetable fats and oils, comprising largely CPO, and iron and steel. Agriculture exports contracted by 3.32 per cent to around $410 million from a year earlier. For imports, raw materials, which accounted for the majority of overall imports, posted the fastest growth at 55.82 per cent to $12.31 billion. These was followed by consumer and capital goods. Iron and steel imports increased by $181.7 million from a month earlier, followed by sugar and vehicles. Faisal Rachman, an economist at state-owned publicly listed Bank Mandiri, said export growth beat the market forecast of 44.37 per cent, while import growth was lower than the forecast of 55.4 per cent. The trade surplus was higher by 49.09 per cent than the forecast of $3.85 billion. The record-high trade surplus was unexpected, said Faisal. “As high commodity prices seem to be relatively persistent until the end of 2021, thus supporting Indonesia's export performance for quite some time, we believe that there is a potential for the current account balance in full year 2021 to record a small surplus,” Faisal said in an analysis published on Monday.