Machinery exports rose 13 percent to US$7.6 billion in the first four months of this year from a year earlier, bolstered by improving global demand as the world economy continues to recover, according to Ministry of Economic Affairs figures released on Friday.
The report was a welcome reversal of the negative trend seen in the past two years.
Machinery exports hit a high of US$22.9 billion in 2014, but fell 6.1 percent in 2015 and dropped another 1.7 percent last year, the ministry’s data showed.
Machine tool exports rose 13.7 percent year-on-year to US$970 million during the four-month period, accounting for 12.8 percent of all machinery exports, the highest of any product category.
Exports of machinery for semiconductor and flat panel production during the same period rose 43.6 percent to US$710 million, taking a 9.5 percent share of total machinery exports, data showed.
Analysts said the high sales growth reflected solid global demand for mobile devices.
Also during the period, exports of robots for industrial use rose 25.4 percent from a year earlier to US$409 million.
China was the largest buyer, accounting for a 31.2 percent share of outbound robot sales, followed by South Korea (24.6 percent) and Japan (10.7 percent), data showed.
Overall, China/Hong Kong was the biggest overseas buyer of machinery products in the period, accounting for 27.5 percent of the total ahead of the US (17.9 percent), ASEAN (15.6 percent) and Europe (13.3 percent).
In the first quarter, Taiwanese machinery had a 6.5 percent market share in China after hitting 5.3 percent for all of last year, 5.3 percent for 2015 and 5.5 percent in 2014, the ministry said.
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