Mr. Jokowi, There Was a Massive Gold Export at the Beginning of the Year, What's This Signal?

JAKARTA - The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) reported that there was a significant increase in exports of precious metals and jewellery/gems (HS 71) in January 2023.

Deputy for Production Statistics at BPS, Habibullah, revealed that the foreign trade value of these luxury goods reached US$257.9 million last month.

This figure is RI's largest non-oil and gas export compared to the position of the two rubber commodities (HS 40) which only recorded a value of 43.7 million dollars.

"Exports of precious metals and jewellery/gems from January 2023 to December 2022 rose 46.5 per cent and increased by 43.7 per cent in volume", he said while stating the media crew on Wednesday, February 15.

Habibullah explained that many of these luxury products were ordered by several trading partner countries, from the Asian region to Europe.

"The main export destination countries are Switzerland, Singapore and Japan", he said.

For information, the information conveyed by Habibullah was confirmed by the further data he shared. According to him, Switzerland became the export destination country which experienced the highest increase earlier this year.

It was revealed that Indonesia's exports to Switzerland in January 2023 amounted to 144.3 million dollars. This number is even higher than Indonesia's other trading partners, such as South Korea, Italy, Norway, and even Germany.

"The increase in exports to Switzerland occurred in precious metals and jewellery/gems, mineral fuels, machinery and electrical equipment", said Habibullah.

Meanwhile, in general, Indonesia's export value in January 2023 was US$22.31 billion. Meanwhile, the value of imports was recorded at 18.44 billion US dollars.

This incision made Indonesia experience a trade balance surplus of 3.87 billion US dollars as well as extending the record surplus for 33 consecutive months since May 2020.