KUCHING, May 6 — Sarawak registered a total trade value of RM143.7 billion last year compared to RM137.6 billion in 2017, state Assistant Minister of International Trade and e-Commerce Datuk Naroden Majais told the Sarawak Legislative Assembly today.
He said the total trade value for the first two months of this year was RM24.5 billion compared to RM22.5 billion in 2018, an expansion of 9.1 per cent.
He said Sarawak’s exports grew by 10.6 per cent from RM15.7 billion to RM17.4 billion while imports increased slightly by 5.5 per cent from RM6.7 billion to RM7.1 billion.
“Export receipts from liquefied natural gas remains the biggest contributor at 48.3 per cent, followed by crude petroleum at 11.1 per cent and palm oil at 7.8 per cent,” he said when replying to Dennis Ngau (GPS-Telang Usan) during a Question and Answer session.
Naroden said the three major export partners for Sarawak were: Japan (27.4 per cent), peninsular Malaysia (14 per cent) and China (12.4 per cent).
These three markets contributed 53.8 per cent to Sarawak’s total export value, he said.
He also said the state’s main import items are still machinery and transport equipment (33.8 per cent), followed by chemical products (11 per cent) and manufactured goods (11.7 per cent).
“The higher importation of machinery and transport equipment is for the construction of major infrastructure developments in the state,” he said.
Naroden said Sarawak’s major commodities, particularly oil and gas, manufactured goods and agriculture products have always been sought after in the global market due to their high quality.
He said oil and gas contributed about 64.85 per cent to the state’s economy as of February this year.
He said manufactured goods contributed 24.02 per cent, agriculture products 10.61 per cent and other mechandise 0.53 per cent to the economy of the state.
“Though we do export agriculture products, the volume is considered small compared to the potential demand of our local overseas,” he said, adding that fruits such as durian, rambutan, pineapple, mangoes and bananas are highly sought after by countries like China.
Naroden said the state government is introducing various programmes, including precision and smart farming to improve quality and sustainable production to commercialise the agriculture sector for the export market.
