PHILIPPINE imports continued to perform strongly, growing 22% in August to $4.412 billion from $3.617 billion in the same month last year, according to latest data from the National Statistics Office.
This brought imports for the first eight months of the year to $68.308 billion, up 31.3% year on year from $52.034 billion.
Accounting for 37.3% of the aggregate import bill, payments for electronic products hit $1.645 billion in August, 27.2% over last year’s $1.293 billion.
Imports of mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials represented 14.4% of the total import bill, a 0.7% increase to $634.75 million from $630.17 million.
Inward shipments of transport equipment amounted to $216.26 million or 4.9% of the total.
Japan was the country’s biggest source of imports for August, accounting for a 13.6% share of the whole, higher by 32% to $600.53 million from $454.81 million in August 2009.
The US was the second biggest source of imports with payments worth $460.29 million, up 12.6% from $408.97 million.
Singapore came third with a 10% share of the total, a growth of 48.1% to $442.76 million from $299.03 million.
