Korea’s export growth in H1 ranks first among major countries

[Image source: Gettyimagesbank]

South Korea saw the highest export growth among the major countries tracked by the World Trade Organization (WTO) in the first half of 2024, thanks to the semiconductor and automobile exports’ strong performances.

According to the WTO on Sunday, the country’s export growth rate for the first half of the year was 9.1 percent, ranking first among the top 10 exporting countries. China was second at 5.2 percent, followed by Mexico (2.6 percent), the United States (2.3 percent), and Canada (0.2 percent).

Japan, on the other hand, saw a 3.6 percent decline, with Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, and France also seeing a decline in exports.

Korea’s export value for the first half of 2024 was $335 billion, putting it in 7th place, but the gap with the leading countries narrowed. China ranked first at $2.02 trillion of export value, followed by the United States at $1.03 trillion. Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Japan, and Korea followed in that order.

Korea’s particularly high export growth compared to other countries can be attributed largely to the global increase in demand for semiconductors and electronic devices, sectors in which the country has strong export competitiveness.

Its semiconductor exports surged by an impressive 50.9 percent in the first half of the year, with server and enterprise memory exports soaring due to increased demand from artificial intelligence (AI)-related industries, and memory fixed prices maintaining double-digit growth.

Automobile exports, mainly hybrid cars and internal combustion engines, also performed well, despite a slowdown in electric vehicle sales due to the downturn in EV demand.

“The improvement in the semiconductor and electronic device industries significantly boosted exports in these sectors, and other major products like automobiles and ships also performed well across the board,” a trade policy officer at the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy said. “It is rare globally for a country to have such a balanced export portfolio.”

This positive trend continued into the second half of 2024.

According to data released by the trade ministry on Sunday, the country’s exports totaled $57.9 billion in August, a 11.4 percent increase from the same period a year ago and marking the highest figure for August on record. Monthly exports also increased in the month for 11 consecutive months.