Two-way trade tops $160 billion

Increased exports and imports helped push New Zealand’s two-way trade of goods and services to $160.7 billion for the year ended September 2018, up $16.7b from the year ended September 2017, Stats NZ said today.

Two-way trade, which measures total exports plus imports between New Zealand and the rest of the world, surpassed $160 billion for the first time.

“Trade is critical to New Zealand’s economy. The revenue New Zealand earns from selling goods and services overseas helps pay for the goods and services we import from other countries,” international statistics senior manager Peter Dolan said.

The value of New Zealand’s imports and exports has increased in the year ended September 2018, repeating a pattern generally seen in the past decade. Imports and exports reached new highs, with imports up $9.4b to $79.1b from 2017, and exports up $7.3b to $81.6b.

Imports of vehicles, parts and accessories made up 11.2 per cent of total imports for the year ended September 2018, a drop of 0.5 per cent compared to a year earlier. 

Proportion of service imports constant

While the value of goods and services imports has increased over time, the proportion of total imports between goods and services has remained relatively constant, says Stats NZ.

“Imports of services were almost 25 per cent of total imports in 2018, the same proportion seen a decade earlier,” Dolan said.

However, the proportion of services that New Zealand imports from our top five trading partners vary by country. In the year ended September 2018, services contributed just under half of the total imports received from Australia. At the other end of the spectrum, services contributed just over 5 percent of the imports New Zealand received from China and Japan.

The share of services increased between 2008 and 2018 for all of New Zealand’s top trading partners, except for Japan which decreased.