The strong growth in the import of capital goods and raw materials was attributed to growing investment inflows and rising demand for industrial products
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) said Indonesia`s imports were valued at US$16.33 billion in July, up 0.75 percent year-on-year .

The country`s imports in the same month last year were worth US$16.21 billion.

BPS chief Suryamin said here today imports in July included oil and gas worth US$2.73 billion and other commodities valued at US$13.36 billion.

This agency also reported the country`s inflation was 0.95 percent in August higher than 0.7 percent-0.8 percent predicted by the central bank earlier.

Indonesia`s import of capital goods in the first semester of 2012 rose 34.9 percent to US$19.4 billion year-on-year, according to the Trade Ministry.

Indonesia`s imports in the first half of 2012 meanwhile reached US$96.4 billion, a 15.3 percent increase compared to the same period last year, Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan said on Friday.

Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan said in a press conference on Friday that the import of consumer goods rose by 6.5 percent to US$6.8 billion from a year earlier. However, the import of raw and auxiliary materials increased 11.8 percent to US$70.3 billion year-on-year, he said.

The strong growth in the import of capital goods and raw materials was attributed to growing investment inflows and rising demand for industrial products, he said.

He said the import of capital goods recorded the highest growth due to rising demand for imported products such as airplanes and spare parts which rose 73.7 percent and motor vehicles and spare parts (45.3 percent), iron and steel products (43.3 percent) and mechanical appliances (25.4 percent).

Non-oil/non-gas imports in the first half of 2012 increased 16.5 percent to US$74.9 billion from the same period last year.

Oil/gas imports in the January-June 2012 period reached US$21.4 billion, an increase of 11.4 percent compared to the same period last year, fueled by rising gas demand which surged 149.8 percent to US$1.8 billion, he said.

"Our total imports in June 2012 reached US$16.7 billion, down by 2.1 percent from a month earlier," he said.
(H-ASG)

Editor: Ella Syafputri
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