Trade Trend
Sri Lanka exports up 9.4-pct in April, trade gap down amid weak credit June 20, 2014 (LBO) - Sri Lanka's exports grew 9.4 percent to 762.2 million US dollars, while imports fell 5.3 percent in April from a year earlier, amid weak domestic credit, allowing foreign reserves to grow, official data showed.Apparel exports grew 22.5 percent in April to 336.8 million dollars from a year earlier with strong demand from the US and EU, the Central Bank said. Small markets like Russia and also seen a strong growth.
Agricultural products grew 13.7 percent to 199.7 million dollars. Tea grew 9.8 percent to 116.8 million US dollars with both price and volume gains helping.
Rubber product exports fell 0.6 percent to 57.9 million US dollars.
Imports fell 5.3 percent to 1,444.5 million US dollars with consumer goods down 3.2 percent to 263.9 million US dollars. Food and beverages fell 14.2 percent to 108.8 million US dollars.
Intermediate goods grew 0.2 percent to 889.3 million US dollars with textile related imports up 16.6 percent to 179.8 million US dollars, amid strong apparel exports.
Fuel was down 8.8 percent to 316 million US dollars.
Investment goods were down 20.4 percent to 289.2 million US dollars. Machinery was down 17.7 percent to 153.5 million US dollars and transport equipment was down 42.1 percent to 34.9 million US dollars.
Building material imports were down 13.6 percent to 100.5 million US dollars.
The trade gap in April fell 17.7 percent to 682.2 million US dollars.
In the five months to April, exports rose 16.9 percent to 3,571.1 million US dollars, and imports rose only 2.6 percent to 6,192.4 million US dollars, The trade gap declined 12.1 percent to 2,621 million US dollars.
The trade gap is caused when inflows to the financial accounts such as government foreign borrowings (exports of debt) and remittances (exports of labour) are spent by their recipients.
However Sri Lanka's credit growth has been weak or negative in the past few months.When domestic credit is weak, all inflows are not quickly spent and resulting in liquidity build ups in the domestic banking system and an increase in foreign reserves at the Central Bank.
Foreign reserves rose to 8.9 billion US dollar by end April partly helped by a 500 million US sovereign dollar bond sale.
Corrected - Trade data relates to April 2014
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