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View all search resultsBatam sees positive trend in export during pandemic
Batam, a city with a population of 1.2 million, is the busiest region in Riau Islands province in terms of economic activity.
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(Courtesy of BP Batam)
B
atam, a city with a population of 1.2 million, is the busiest region in Riau Islands province in terms of economic activity. Apart from that, the industrial city of Batam has a highly strategic location because it is situated in between the Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean, precisely in the Strait of Malacca, one of the world’s primary sea routes.
This partly explains why Batam sees high international trade activities. Export and import is one of the primary economic activities in Batam, and every industry in Batam is strongly related to international trade activities.
Based on cumulative data at Kota Batam’s Statistics Indonesia (BPS) for the January-August 2021 period, the trade figures show an increasing trend in the volumes recorded in export and import in the past several years.
The export volume, for example, increased 18.94 percent to US$7.268 billion, from $6.110 billion in the corresponding period in the previous year.
Batam’s export value is the largest contributor to Riau Islands province’s revenue, with cumulative exports contributing 71.3 percent of the total cumulative exports from Riau Islands province.
Kota Batam’s BPS also revealed that 88.86 percent of Batam’s total exports were products from the processing industries, which included machines/electric equipment, oil and animal and vegetable fat, machines/mechanical aerospace as three categories of products that lead export market share in Batam.
By country export target, Batam has a stable export market target annually. Singapore, the United States and the People’s Republic of China are the three export targeted countries that recorded the largest volumes compared to other countries.
Meanwhile, Batam has also seen an increase in import volume, with imports recorded at $6.958 billion, or an increase of 24.44 percent from $5.591 billion in the corresponding period of the previous year. The imported products are commonly comprised of goods that will later be reprocessed as basic materials that are needed for industrial processing in Batam.
As shown in the above figures, despite the significant increase in imports, Batam’s economy can be said to be relatively stable thanks to the relatively good surplus of $185.91 million.
Aside from that, the increase in exports and imports serves as an initial barometer for the economic activity recovery in Batam, which was previously battered by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The economic recovery process is marked by an increase in demand for goods, such as machines supporting industries, electronic equipment/components and health devices, with the export volume increasing 19.4 percent from the corresponding period in the previous year.
For the government, it is good to develop the trend and spur the recovery of every economic sector in Batam and also Indonesia.
