Minister Of Trade Budi Disbursed The Cause Of The Lowest Trade Balance Surplus In 60 Months

JAKARTA - Minister of Trade (Mendag) Budi Santoso opened his voice regarding the shrinking trade balance surplus in April 2025. In fact, this is quite significant and the lowest in the last 60 months.

Budi said there were a number of causes that made the trade balance surplus decrease. One of them is the Eid al-Fitr holiday which makes export activities a little late.

"So exports from January to April compared to last year have indeed increased by 6.65 percent. But March-April has decreased. After we analyzed the first one yesterday, in early April, it was still a Eid holiday. So there are still many holidays so exports are also reduced," said Budi at the Ministry of Trade Office, Jakarta, Wednesday, June 4.

In addition to domestic factors, continued Budi, global conditions have also decreased to affect Indonesia's export performance. One of them is the reciprocal tariff policy imposed by the United States Government (US) Donal Trump against a number of trade partner countries.

According to Budi, this condition makes market players both exporters and importers in various parts of the world still wait and see in making decisions.

Therefore, Budi said the phenomenon of shrinking the trade balance was not only experienced by Indonesia. He said a number of countries in ASEAN also experienced the same thing.

"Yesterday when we met friends from the Trade Minister in Kuala Lumpur during the ASEAN Summit, we also talked about the impact on each of them being very large. In fact, many exporters tend to be waiting," he said.

Budi said that not only exports to the United States were affected, but also exports to other countries had also slowed down due to the domino effect of uncertainty in the current global conditions.

"So, it's not just exports to America but exports to other countries are also waiting for each other. Moreover, now it seems that there is no clarity anymore. We are also still waiting for the second negotiation to be scheduled," he said.

For your information, US President Donald Trump himself will implement a reciprocal tariff policy. Where, the US will impose an import duty of 32 percent for Indonesia.

Currently, the government is negotiating trade rates with the United States government. The technical team from the two countries has also exchanged information to continue the negotiations.

If the negotiations set by the government and the US government fail, then the reciprocal rate will take effect from July 9, 2025.