S.Korea's ICT products export falls for 4th month in October

SEOUL, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's export of information and communications technology (ICT) products kept falling for the fourth consecutive month through October, government data showed Monday.

The ICT products shipment shrank 10.3 percent from a year earlier to 17.87 billion U.S. dollars in October, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy.

Global demand for locally-made tech products weakened amid rising worry about the global economic downturn.

Semiconductor export dropped 16.2 percent over the year to 9.41 billion dollars in October due to lower prices for memory chips. It fell below 10 billion dollars in 18 months.

Display panel shipment retreated 9.6 percent to 2.03 billion dollars, but mobile devices export jumped 13.0 percent to 1.55 billion dollars on solid demand for newly launched smartphones.

The ICT products export to Vietnam, the United States and the European Union (EU) all dipped to 3.21 billion dollars, 2.05 billion dollars and 960 million dollars respectively.

Import for ICT products spiked 13.6 percent from a year earlier to 13.76 billion dollars in October, keeping a double-digit increase for the 24th successive month. It was the highest since relevant data began to be compiled in 1996.

The local currency's depreciation to the greenback raised the import costs for tech products.

Trade surplus in the ICT industry came to 4.11 billion dollars in October compared to a surplus of 7.8 billion dollars tallied in the same month of last year.