Singapore's key exports rose a mild 2.2 percent in September as higher shipments of pharmaceuticals helped counter a sustained fall in exports of computer parts and other electronic goods, the government said Wednesday. The increase in non-oil domestic exports (NODX) was below economists' forecasts for a gain of between six and 11 percent.
It followed a gain of 10.9 percent in August, compared with a year earlier, said the trade promotion body International Enterprise Singapore. On a month-on-month seasonally adjusted basis, non-oil domestic exports fell 1.5 percent in September, down from the 1.9 percent growth in August, IE Singapore said.
Non-electronic NODX growth was a healthy 13.9 percent in the month, after a 22.0 percent gain in August, it said. "The growth of non-electronic NODX was contributed by the higher domestic exports of pharmaceuticals, printing bookbinding machinery, disk media products and specialised machinery," it said.
Pharmaceuticals exports rose by 22.1 percent in September to 1.88 billion dollars (1.28 billion US) compared with the same month a year earlier, the data showed. But domestic electronic goods exports, a sector which is dependent on global demand, contracted for the eighth consecutive month. They were down by 10.6 percent in September, IE Singapore said.
Although consumer electronics exports rose 38.6 percent in the month, those gains were outweighed by fewer shipments of computer parts, integrated circuits, telecommunications equipment and disk drives, IE Singapore said. Domestic exports of electronics goods were valued at 6.11 billion dollars, against 6.43 billion dollars in August, it said.
Total trade grew by 0.7 percent last month, unchanged from August, and totalled 71.37 billion dollars. The monthly trade figures are a closely-watched measure of Singapore's trade-reliant economy, which the government said powered to a 9.4 percent growth in the third quarter.