UAE non oil foreign trade stood at AED 53 billion.

According to a preliminary report issued by the Federal Customs Authority, the UAE’s non oil foreign trade reached AED 53 billion in terms of value in February 2010.

Out of this amount, imports amounted to AED 35.2 billion exports were AED 4.9 billion while re exports reached AED12.9 billion. The total non oil foreign trade weighed 5.4 million tonnes out of which 3.3 million were imports; 1.5 million were exports and 0.6 million tonnes were re exports.

Mr Khalid Ali Al Bustani acting DG of the Authority said that a reading of the February figures in 2009 and 2010 indicated a sustained growth of exports at 1% to AED 4.9 billion in February 2010 against AED 4.8 billion for February 2009, while re exports grew at 2% from AED 12.92 billion to AED 12.95 billion. Imports declined by 1% from AED 35.6 billion to AED 35.2 billion for the month under review.

He said that the steep rise in exports and drop in imports indicate to the marked improvement in the balance of trade of the UAE with its foreign trade partners. It shows the growing strength of UAE competitive edge in global markets despite the impact of the world financial crisis which hit the global economies at that time.

Regarding the geographic distribution of foreign trade, the authority’s report said that India, China, US, Germany, Japan, UK, Italy, South Korea, France and Switzerland were the top 10 countries the UAE imported from in February with a total value of AED 22.1 billion amounting to 63% of total imports. Meanwhile, India, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Iran, Switzerland, Turkey, Pakistan, Kuwait and Iraq were the top importing countries from the UAE for non oil exports which totalled AED 3.6 billion accounting for 74% of the total exports.

Source : khaleejtimes.com