Export orders hit a 12-month high last month, while domestic consumption also rose to its highest in 16 months as the nation slowly emerged from the global financial crisis.
Export orders rose 4.4 percent to US$31.75 billion last month, recording the first increase since October last year, when the financial crisis swept across all sectors and hurt Taiwan’s export-dependent economy.
“It seems we are emerging from the financial tsunami,” Huang Ji-shih (黃吉實), director of the statistics department under the Ministry of Economic Affairs, told a press conference yesterday.
The precision machinery sector posted the strongest growth, at 29.5 percent, to US$2.9 billion, thanks to the huge demand for panels. Information and communications products recorded the highest amount of orders at US$8.3 billion, up 5.6 percent.
China, including Hong Kong, was the largest source of orders at US$8.1 billion, representing a rise of 19.6 percent from last year.
The US came in the second at US$7.1 billion, growing 0.7 percent from last year, statistics showed.
Export orders from six ASEAN countries — Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam — showed the largest increase at 16.3 percent last month.
Total exports from January to October hit US$259.5 billion, down 15.8 percent from the same period last year.
Huang said that export orders for the fourth quarter looked set to reverse the negative trend in the first three quarters. For the whole year, however, export orders were estimated to reach between US$310 billion and US$320 billion, down from last year’s US$351.7 billion, he said.
Figures from the statistics department also showed that local consumption —based on sales in the wholesale, retail as well as food and beverage (F&B) sectors — was also on the uptick last month as consumers were more willing to spend.
Revenues from these sectors totaled NT$1.13 trillion (US$34.2 billion), up 4.2 percent from a year ago, the highest growth in 16 months.
Retail posted a 5.9 percent rise in sales to NT$289 billion, mainly fueled by sales of autos, motorcycles and components, which expanded 21.5 percent.
Specifically, sales from department stores, which fall under the general merchandise category, grew 10.8 percent last month, thanks to the annual anniversary promotions that attracted consumers to loosen their purse strings.
F&B sales, meanwhile, expanded 0.7 percent to NT$25 billion.
Under this sector, revenues of beverage stores grew 4.5 percent, while restaurant revenue increased by 0.17 percent.
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