JAKARTA- Indonesia’s trade surplus fell almost a third in 2023 from a year earlier, as exports and imports dropped amid falling commodity prices and weakening global trade, data from the country’s statistics bureau showed on Monday.
The 2023 trade surplus fell to $36.93 billion from a record high of $54.46 in 2022, which was fueled by the global commodity boom.
Prices of Indonesia’s main commodities, including coal, palm oil and nickel, fell sharply last year. Some economists predict a further drop this year, though at a slower rate than in 2023.
Exports pulled back to $258.82 billion in 2023 from $291.9 billion in 2022, which was also a record high.
Imports reached $221.89 billion last year, down from $237.45 billion a year before.
The trade surplus in December, however, beat expectations at $3.3 billion, helped by better-than-expected exports and declining imports. Economists polled by Reuters had expected a $1.92 billion surplus.
December’s shipments fell 5.76 percent from a year earlier to $22.41 billion, less than a decline of 8.1 percent forecast in the poll.
Imports dropped 3.81 percent to $19.11 billion, compared with a 0.4 percent increase forecast in the poll.
The December trade balance was the 44th monthly surplus since May 2020, the statistics bureau said.
Myrdal Gunarto, economist with Maybank Indonesia, sees the surplus trend continuing this year considering current prices of Indonesia’s top export commodities are still enough to support exports.
“(Exports) will also be supported by the country’s effort to develop the downstream industry of mineral sector,” he added.
Meanwhile, Indonesia, a major thermal coal exporter, aims to produce 710 million metric tons of coal in 2024, the mining minister said on Monday, after posting record output last year.
Indonesia’s coal output in 2023 was 775 million tons, up from 687 million tons a year earlier and came in above the 695 million tons target, the country’s Mining Minister Arifin Tasrif told reporters.
