Malaysia's exports decreased 5.3 percent year-on-year to 66.6 billion ringgit (16.3 billion U.S. dollars) in February, the lowest level since August 2016, official data showed Thursday.
Malaysia's international trade and industry minister said in a statement that Malaysia's trade for the month declined by 7.2 percent year-on-year to 122.15 billion ringgit (29.92 billion U.S. dollars) due to lower trades with major trading partners.
imports posted a faster rate of contraction compared to exports, declining by 9.4 percent to 55.54 billion ringgit (13.60 billion U.S. dollars), resulting in a larger trade surplus of 11.06 billion ringgit (2.71 billion U.S. dollars).
For February, exports of manufactured goods which constituted 83.8 percent of total exports contracted by 4.3 percent, dragged by lower shipments of petroleum products, manufacture of metal as well as optical and scientific equipment.
Meanwhile, exports of mining goods fell 5.5 percent year-on-year to 5.8 billion ringgit (1.42 billion U.S. dollars), owing to lower exports of crude petroleum.
Exports of agriculture goods also contracted by 13.7 percent to 4.48 billion ringgit (1.10 billion U.S. dollars), due mainly to the decline in exports of palm oil and palm oil-based agriculture products.
For the first two months, total trade droped by 2.2 percent to 281.43 billion ringgit (68.93 billion U.S. dollars) compared to the same period in 2018. Exports dropped 0.8 percent year-on-year to 152 billion ringgit (29.92 billion U.S. dollars), while imports slipped by 3.8 percent to 129.43 billion ringgit (31.70 billion U.S. dollars).
MIDF Research said in a note Wednesday that the lackluster exports in February was mainly due to a short calendar month on top of long Chinese New Year holidays.
"Amid higher base effects and continuous signs of easing key global indicators, we foresee exports growth to moderate further at 3.6 percent this year," said the research house.
The moderating pace was consistent with global commodity prices, the expectation of a slight slowdown in overall business performance on top of the uncertainty over global trade, it added.
Malaysia's central bank indicated last week that the country's gross exports growth this year is likely to halve to 3.4 percent from 6.8 percent in 2018, in line with the more moderate expansion in the global economy and trade activity.
