SEIPI highlights strong Feb exports

THE head of the Philippines’ electronics industry group on Tuesday acknowledged the industry’s performance as electronics and semiconductor exports expanded by 8.1 percent in February compared with the same time last year, as categories posted strong growth during the month.

In an email sent to media on Tuesday, Dan Lachica, president of Semiconductor and Electronics Industries in the Philippines Foundation Inc. (Seipi), said the Philippine electronics exports in February went up to $2.13 billion from $1.97 billion in the same month in 2015.

The electronics exports accounted for 49.43 percent of the total Philippine exports of $4.31 billion in February 2016.

“Five sectors grew from last - nications with a 204.26 percent growth, from $28.53 million last year to $86.80 million this year,” Lachica said in the email, citing the exports data from the Philippine Statistics Authority that came out the same day.

“Furthermore, the following sectors registered increases: consumer electronics at 116.39 percent, communication/ radar at 40.44 percent, automotive electronics at 17.21 percent and components/ devices (semiconductors) at 12.25 percent,” he added.

The four electronic categories that posted declines in February percent, followed by control and instrumentation at 18.64 percent, medical/ industrial instrumentation at 18.06 percent, and electronic data processing at 10.77 percent.

Despite the year-on-year growth, however, electronics exports dipped by 0.52 percent compared to $2.142 billion in January.

Since the start of the year, January to February electronic exports registered 6.5 percent growth, amounting to $ 4.272 billion compared with the $4.011 billion recorded in the January-February 2015, a growth pace that is higher so far than the industry group’s forecast for the year.

Earlier, Lachica said exports of electronics and semiconductors are expected to grow modestly by 2 percent to 5 percent this year -- lower than the actual 8 percent growth logged in 2015 -- given the persistent of weakness in global demand.

The country’s top electronics market is Hong Kong, which was the destination of 16.8 percent of the total electronics export during the month. It is followed by the United States (13.8 percent), Japan (12.5 percent), Singapore (12.2 percent) and China (11.4 percent).

In 2015, the electronics industry logged $29.92 billion worth of exports, 2.8 million workers, and P80.783 billion or $1.75 billion worth of investments, Seipi said.