Central bank says drop due to fall in imports and rise in secondary income inflows.
Tanzania's central bank (BoT) revealed that its current account deficit shrank by $580 million to $335 million during the quarter ending June 2017. This is compared with the $915.6 million deficit experienced in the corresponding quarter last year.
According to the BoT, the drop was mainly attributed to a fall in imports partly associated with the implementation of the EAC Single Custom Territory combined with an increase in secondary income inflows; particularly official transfers.
The Bank shows export earnings in the quarter ending June 2017 amounted to $1,959.2 million, a $697.9 million increase from the amount attained in the first quarter March 2017 (which was $1,261.3 million) but a weakening from $2,031.2 million recorded in the second quarter June 2016.
The decline was driven by plunge in exports of traditional, non-traditional goods and manufactured goods exports.
“The decline in the value of traditional goods exports was driven by volume, while non-traditional export earnings declined following low export performance of manufactured goods, re-export and some items under ‘other exports’ sub group” explained the BoT report.
The traditional exports account shows a 20.8 per cent decline from $78.3 million earnings in June 2016 to $62 million at the quarter ended June 2017.
While the same account note down $246.0 million in the first quarter. Non-traditional exports comprising gold, diamonds and other minerals, settled at $989.8 million, a 8.2 per cent fall from $1,078.3 million recorded the same quarter last year.
Manufactured goods went down by 15.3 per cent from $269.8 million to $228.6 million. Other exports and re-exports achieved $286.6 million and $65.5 million respectively, down by 13.3 and 21.5 percentage points from previous records.
Manufactured goods exports were lower than reported in the quarter ending June 2016 partly allied with the implementation of EAC Single Custom Territory.