South Korea's exports of information and communications technology (ICT) products fell for nine straight months through June as demand for tech items weakened amid global economic slump, a government report showed on Thursday.
ICT exports, the country's main export engine, reduced 5.1 percent from a year earlier to 13.48 billion U.S. dollars in June, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy. It posted the ninth straight month of decline since October last year.
Mobile phone shipments tumbled 36.5 percent to 620 million dollars, pulling down the June tech exports, but outbound shipments of computers and relevant items increased 19 percent to 690 million dollars.
Semiconductor exports inched down 0.5 percent to 5.28 billion dollars in June, but the decline slowed down from a 4.4 percent slide in May. Exports of display panels plunged 24.4 percent over the year to 2.12 billion dollars in June, keeping a falling pace of more than 20 percent since February.
Tech exports to China, South Korea's largest trading partner, dipped 6.7 percent to 7.14 billion dollars, with those to the European Union (EU) slipping 9.1 percent to 760 million dollars. But, shipments to Vietnam and India logged a double-digit fall. ICT imports inched down 1.1 percent to 7.29 billion dollars, sending the June trade surplus in tech sector to 6.19 billion dollars.
For the first six months of this year, ICT exports amounted to 76.39 billion dollars, down 10.4 percent compared with the same period of last year. The imports fell 2.4 percent to 43.28 billion dollars, leading the first-half trade surplus in the tech sector to 33.11 billion dollars.
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