MACAO, June 29 (Xinhua) -- The total value of merchandise export of China's Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) in May 2017 increased by 7.4 percent year-on-year, and total merchandise import went up by 10.4 percent in May, the SAR's statistics department said on Thursday.
Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that the total value of merchandise export in May amounted to 894 million patacas (about 111 million U.S. dollars); value of re-exports (752 million patacas) increased by 10.9 percent, with that of travel goods, handbags and related products (78 million patacas) surging by 92.8 percent.
Total merchandise import went up by 10.4 percent year-on-year to 5.84 billion patacas, of which imports of gold jewelry and watches increased by 73.4 percent and 47.5 percent respectively. Merchandise trade deficit amounted to 4.94 billion patacas.
The statistics also showed that in the first five months of 2017, total value of merchandise export increased by 8.9 percent year-on-year to 4.67 billion patacas, of which value of re-exports (3.94 billion patacas) and domestic exports (734 million patacas) rose by 9.5 percent and 5.7 percent respectively.
Total value of merchandise import from January to May grew by 5.3 percent year-on-year to 29.13 billion patacas. That means external merchandise trade totaled 33.81 billion patacas in the first five months of 2017, up by 5.8 percent compared with 31.96 billion patacas a year earlier.
Merchandise trade deficit widened to 24.46 billion patacas during the same period.
