Portuguese exports of goods grew 7% in February to EUR 6,379 million, thanks to sales abroad of all transport equipment and accessories, a category that rose 26% year-on-year to EUR 1,230 million, the National Institute of Statistics. Automotive components, which represent the largest share of this product group, recorded an increase of 10.4% to EUR 617 million, but the highlight is passenger car exports, which rose by 70% to EUR 437 million. Impressive figures but still below the pre-pandemic period.
In January and February, the transport equipment and accessories category grew by 19.3% to EUR 2,237 million, components by 11.7% to almost EUR 1,240 million, and car exports by EUR 56.1 million to EUR 677 million. But in the first two months of 2019, car exports were worth more than 811 million euros.
A reality that does not surprise the Associação Automóvel de Portugal (ACAP), whose secretary general, Helder Pedro, recalls that the sector has been “hit hard” by the pandemic, but also by the semiconductor supply crisis that followed, without yet recovered compared to the pre-pandemic period.
In February, all major economic categories showed a positive export performance, with the exception of fuels and lubricants, which fell 24.2% to 398 million. Primary products were down 65.1% and processed products down 19.4% year-over-year. This is explained by the planned shutdown for maintenance at the Sines refinery, which started on January 23 and lasted a month and a half.
Excluding fuels and lubricants, there was a 10% increase in exports and 14.3% in imports in February, with this growth of 11.8% in January and February cumulative exports, and of 12.9% in the imports for the same period.
In terms of destinations, the emphasis should be on the increase in sales to Spain, an increase of 6.4% to 1,673 million euros, and on the increase of 12.1% and 29.7% in exports to Germany and the United Kingdom respectively. Kingdom. They are the third and fifth largest destinations for national exports.
But imports are also increasing. Portuguese purchases from Spain grew by 8.3%, Germany by 11.6% and France by 18.9%. China ranks fourth and grew 12.9% in February.
In total, Portugal shipped €12,768 million worth of goods abroad in the first two months of the year, an increase of 10.3% over the same period of 2022.
The increase in imports widens the trade deficit. In February, Portugal imported goods worth EUR 8.746 million, a year-on-year growth of 6.7%, causing the trade deficit to worsen by EUR 129 million to EUR 2.367 million.
In January and February, imports grew by 8.6% to EUR 17,167 million and the trade deficit amounted to EUR 4,399 million.
Ilídia Pinto is a journalist for Dinheiro Vivo
Source: DN
