Bananas are among the Philippines top exports.

Philippine merchandise exports continued to be resilient despite escalating US-China trade frictions and global slowdown, partly due to continued market access in Southeast Asia, Japan, the European Union (EU), as well as US and China, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) reported.

DTI Secretary Ramon Lopez said export growth was positive for the fourth straight month in July at 3.5% year-on-year (yoy) as the country’s exports to US and China expanded 8.9% and 8.5% yoy, respectively.

In July, the US was the Philippines’ biggest export market with 16.9% export share while China was the third largest at 13.9% share.

“Our market access into the US has been supported by the US Generalized System of Preferences, which accords duty-free status to more than 3,000 products, as well as EU which gives GSP+ duty-free status to over 6,000 products. Also, market access into China has improved in light of closer trade relations with the Philippines reinforced by DTI’s more intense export promotion efforts,” said Lopez.

As a result, the Philippines was the third-best export performer in the list of 11 Asian trade-oriented economies for the month, next only to Vietnam and Thailand. Meanwhile, the June export growth rate was revised upward to 3.3% from 1.5%.

Bigger Phl exports of electronics, machinery and transport equipment, fruits and vegetables (led by bananas), gold and other mineral products, largely contributed to the July performance.

Meanwhile, merchandise imports fell 4.2% in July, its 4th-consecutive month of decline, mainly weighed by a double-digit decrease in the importation of raw materials and intermediate goods. As a result of the positive exports and negative imports, the trade-in-goods deficit narrowed 15.5% yoy for the month.

In January to July 2019, Phl merchandise exports edged up 0.1% yoy to $40.4 billion supported by US (+9.8%) and China (+8.6%). In contrast, cumulative merchandise imports were down 1.5% yoy at US$62.7 billion. With this, the cumulative merchandise trade deficit shrank 4.1% yoy to US$22.3 billion. (DTI)