Abu Dhabi’s non-oil trade down 6.3% to 159.9 billion dirhams in 2017

DUBAI: Abu Dhabi’s non-oil foreign merchandise trade fell 6.3 percent to 159.9 billion dirhams ($46.45 billion) last year from 170.6 billion dirhams a year earlier due to lower transactions for capital goods and transport equipment, data from the Statistics Centre-Abu Dhabi (SCAD) showed.
Total non-imports for the year slipped 1.9 percent to 115.514 billion dirhams from 117.807 billion dirhams, while non-oil exports dropped by 19.4 percent to 22.589 billion dirhams from 28.027. billion dirhams. Re-exports were also down for the year to 21.763 billion dirhams from 24.759 billion dirhams in 2016.
Meanwhile, in December 2017 alone, seasonal factors pushed aggregate non-oil trade to 13.214 billion dirhams, 3.4 percent higher compared with the same month of the previous year.
Imports rose 16.9 percent to 9.261 billion dirhams from 7.923 billion dirhams; non-oil shipments were down 1.769 billion dirhams from 1.788 billion dirhams while re-exports dropped 26 percent to 2.274 billion dirhams from 3.072 billion dirhams.
Inward shipments of industrial supplies, which comprised over a third of total imports in 2017, rose 5.5 percent to 43.788 billion dirhams from 41.486 billion dirhams a year earlier. Exports of the similar merchandise meanwhile were down 17.7 percent to 20.430 billion dirhams in 2017 from 24.837 billion dirhams previously. Re-exports plunged by almost 60 percent to 3.04 billion dirhams in 2017 from 7.246 billion dirhams in 2016.
Abu Dhabi’s major non-oil export partners last year were China with 7.572 billion dirhams in transactions; Saudi Arabia at 5.337 billion dirhams and the US with 2.824 billion dirhams. On the import side, the US shipped 16.934 billion dirhams worth of non-oil goods and merchandise to the emirate last year, 21.9 percent lower from 21.689 billion dirhams in 2016; followed by Saudi Arabia at 11.926 billion dirhams, up 6.6 percent from 11.192 billion dirhams and Japan at 10.208 billion dirhams, up 12.4 percent a year earlier.
Abu Dhabi’s non-oil trade data is gathered from the value of all merchandise that passes through the air, sea and land ports within its border, but excludes inter-emirate transactions.