Qatar's trade balance surplus, which represents the difference between total exports and imports, rose in February by 2.9 percent to 22.9 billion riyals ($6.29 billion) year-on-year, while it fell 5.7 percent month-on-month.
According to a report by the Qatar Planning and Statistics Authority, Qatari exports, including those of local origin and re-exports, decreased by 2.2 percent to 31 billion riyals compared to February 2022. It was down 8.7 percent compared to January. The agency's data attributed the increase in exports to the increase in the value of exports of "oil gases and other gaseous hydrocarbons", reaching about 19.6 billion riyals, by 3.7 percent. The value of exports of "petroleum oils and oils of bituminous mineral materials" fell 11.9 percent to nearly 4.8 billion riyals. The value of exports of "petroleum oils and oils obtained from non-crude bituminous mineral materials" fell 18.5 percent to about 2.4 billion riyals.
As for Qatari imports, they amounted to 8.1 billion riyals, a decrease of 14.3 percent annually, and 16.4 percent month-on-month. Asian countries ranked first for the destination countries of Qatari exports in February, with China, South Korea and India accounting for 48.6 percent of total exports, while China came at the top of the countries of origin for Qatar's imports with 15.6 percent, then the United States with 13.1 percent, followed by India with 6.9 percent.
Source (Al-Araby Al-Jadeed Newspaper, Edited)
