BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

20/07/2006

Belarus H1 foreign trade up 32 pct

MINSK (AFX) - Belarus' foreign trade in goods and services were 17.054 bln usd in January-May of 2006, a rise of 31.8 pct compared with the same period last year, according to the National Bank of Belarus, the BelaPAN news service reported.

Belarus' export of services totaled 808.6 mln usd, a rise of 4.4 pct, and imports went up by 8.6 pct to 467.7 mln usd, the Ministry of Statistics and Analysis said.

Export of goods increased by 24.7 pct to 7.511 bln usd while imports rose by 44.6 pct to 8.278 bln.

The country had a trade gap of 767.5 mln usd as of June 1 against an export surplus of 296.5 mln usd on June 1, 2005.

Officials said the deficit can be attributed to a sharp rise in the import of oil, cars, petroleum products, ferrous metals, agricultural machinery and natural gas, as well as to a 35.3 pct decline in the export of potash fertilizers.

Source:

http://www.forbes.com/markets/feeds/afx/2006/07/20/afx2892583.html