Spending on Imports and Exports Down from January to August

Jamaica’s spending on both imports and exports fell for the January to August period. That’s according to data released on Friday by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica, STATIN.

More in this report.

STATIN says total export earnings were valued at nearly one billion two hundred million US dollars (US $1,200,000,000) during the period.

Jamaica’s import expenditure for the period January amounted to just under US $5 billion.

Spending on imports dropped by approximately three per cent compared to the corresponding period in 2023, when imports totalled just over US $5 billion.

This decline was primarily driven by reduced imports of raw materials and intermediate goods, which fell by nearly 13 per cent.

This is coupled with a slight decrease of roughly two per cent in the imports of fuels and lubricants.

Meanwhile, STATIN says revenue from total exports experienced a decline of approximately 14 per cent compared to the same period in 2023. At the time, export earnings stood at nearly one billion four hundred million US dollars (US $1,400,000,000).

The decrease was attributed mainly to a significant drop of over 60 per cent in the value of re-exports.

However, domestic exports recorded a slight increase of just over one per cent, reaching approximately one billion sixty-three million US dollars (US $1,063,000,000).

This improvement was bolstered by an almost nine per cent growth in export values from the mining and quarrying sector.