Tunisia’s trade at current prices has been marked by a worsening of the trade deficit by 8.3% during the first half of the current year to 08.16 billion dinars, the National Institute of Statistics (INS) announced Monday.
In detail, exports went up by 26.6% against 12.7% during the same period in 2017.
In value, exports reached the level of 20.354 billion dinars against 16.072 billion during the same period in 2017.
Similarly, imports maintained a significant growth rate, rising 20.8% against 16.3% in the first half of 2017, for a value of 28.519 billion dinars against 23.607 billion a year earlier.
The hedge rate improved by 3.3 percentage points from the first half of 2017 to 71.4%.
Exports
The increase observed in exports (+ 26.6%) in the first half of 2018 concerns the majority of sectors, said the INS.
In fact, the agriculture and agri-food industries sector posted a growth of 71.8% following the increase
of the country’s sales of olive oil (1.351 billion dinars) and dates (467.8 MD) .
The energy sector grew by 33.1% as a result of the increase in our crude oil sales (895.1 MTD), while manufacturing sector exports grew by 28.5%, the textiles and clothing and leather sector (22.9%) and the mechanical and electrical industries sector (19.4%).
On the other hand, exports of the mining, phosphates and derivatives sector are still down, with a 6.7% decline compared to June 2017.
Imports
The increase in imports of 20.8% is mainly due to the rise recorded in all sectors.
Energy rose by 34.8%, raw materials and semi-finished products by 26.4%, capital goods by 19.3% and mining, phosphates and derivatives by 8.9% and the basic agricultural and food products sector by 7.8%.
geographical distribution
Tunisia’s exports to the European Union (72.7% of total exports) increased by 22.2%. This evolution is explained by the increase in exports to certain European partners, such as Spain 75.5%, Germany 26.6% and France 19.8%.
On the other hand, Tunisia’s sales are down to other European countries especially with the United Kingdom by 29.9%.
With the Arab countries, exports increased with Egypt by 51.8%, Morocco by 33.4% and Libya by 27.8%.
On the other hand, exports to Algeria fell by 11.1%.
For imports, trade in goods with the European Union (55.2% of total imports) grew 22.7% to 15.733 billion dinars. Imports increased by 36.7% with Spain, 21% with Italy and 20.7% with France.
The trade deficit
The balance of the trade balance shows a deficit at the end of June 2018 following the deficit recorded with certain countries, such as China (-2,569 billion dinars), Italy (-1,329 billion), Turkey (-1,031 billion), Russia (-621.6 MD) and Algeria (-608.1 MD).
On the other hand, the balance of the trade balance recorded a surplus with other countries mainly with Tunisia’s first partner France by 1.729 billion dinars, Libya by 448.6 MD and Morocco by 209.8 MD.
