Trade ministry and KITA discuss support for local firms amid slowing export growth

산업부, 수출둔화 조짐에 수출전략회의 개최…범정부 컨트롤타워 가동Multiple economic institutions forecast the nation's export growth will slow down in 2019, mainly because of the ongoing trade war between the U.S. and China.During the first three weeks of January outbound shipments dropped by almost 15 percent on-year.To tackle this issue, the government held a meeting with trade-related organizations. Our Ko Roon-hee has the highlights from that session. The latest figures released by Korea Customs Service on Monday paint a grim picture for the nation's export growth for this year.Exports in the first 20 days of January dropped by 14-point-6 percent compared to the same period last year.The agency attributed the fall to a decrease in exports of semiconductors and petroleum products.Semiconductors, which account for around 20 percent of overall exports,... dropped by almost 30 percent.Analysts have been pointing to lower demand and a fall in memory chip prices.This is mainly due to a decrease in investment in data centers, which had been the main driver of the price rally.In terms of export destinations, shipments to China dropped by more than 22 percent during the same period,... and one possibility is that the trade war between the world's biggest economies is having a chilling effect in Korea. To turn things around, Korea's trade ministry and the Korea International Trade Association met on Monday to discuss ways to support local exporters.Trade Minister Sung Yun-mo sat down with trade-related organizations and company representatives... and promised to hold these meetings every quarter... to listen to their difficulties. Some measures discussed include... expanding support for trade insurance provided by Korea Trade Insurance Corporation.Minister Sung said... the government will continuously work with the private sector to deal with uncertainties coming from the slowdown in global trade growth and in the semiconductor market and the drop in international oil prices. He added that businesses should also participate in those effort... by coming up with new export products and destinations. Ko Roon-hee, Arirang News.