TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan's export orders in November plunged by 23.4% from a year earlier, marking the steepest monthly decline since March 2009.
The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) announced on Tuesday (Dec. 20) that exports in November totaled US$50.14 billion dollars, a year-on-year decrease of 23.4%. This signifies the largest monthly drop in export orders since March 2009, when orders declined 24.3% year-on-year.
November was also the third month in a row in which export orders declined.
November's numbers actually marked the third-highest figure for the month ever, trailing only US$65.5 billion in November 2021 and US$57.8 billion in November 2020. Meanwhile, exports for the first 11 months of the year still rose slightly by 1.4% to US$614.61 billion.
Huang Yu-ling (黃于玲), head of the MOEA's Department of Statistics, was cited by the Commercial Times as saying that there is increasing demand from emerging technology applications, digitization, and cloud data processing needs. However, Huang said that due to the four major factors of weak demand caused by global inflation and interest rate hikes, China's zero-COVID policy, customer inventory adjustments, and the basis numbers from the same period last year being relatively high, the decline in export orders expanded.
Chart shows exports dropping in November. (MOEA image)