Singapore publishes RI trade data for first time in 30 years

Singapore publishes RI trade data for first time in 30 years

Yeoh En-Lai Associated Press Singapore

For the first time in 30 years, Singapore released figures on Wednesday representing its trade with Indonesia, seven months after its largest neighbor questioned Singapore's policy for withholding the figures.

Trade between Singapore and Indonesia was worth S$26.2 billion (US$15.11 billion) in 2003, making Indonesia its seventh-largest trading partner, the island nation's trade promotion body International Enterprise Singapore said in a statement.

The statement was the first on the neighbors' bilateral trade since 1974 when Singapore's founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, and former Indonesian president Soeharto reached a "mutual understanding" to keep the figures secret.

The arrangement continued after Suharto was removed as president in 1998, Singapore's Trade and Industry Ministry said in a statement in July without explaining the reasons for the secrecy.

But last June, Indonesian Minister of Industry and Trade Rini Soewandi said there were marked discrepancies between trade data exchanged between the two nations and said that Singapore should make its information public.

By putting the trade data in the open, it would help the huge archipelago curb smuggling and illegal exports of its natural resources, she said.

In response, Singapore said that every year it handed information to "key Indonesian ministers" and said "Indonesia was free to publish the data publicly."

Singapore imported S$14.5 billion worth of Indonesian goods in 2003, with petroleum products and manufacturing components comprising the bulk, the statement said. Trade with Indonesia made up about 5.5 percent of the S$473.9 billion of goods that Singapore sold and bought last year.

Key imports from Indonesia included telecommunications equipment, refined petroleum products as well as parts of office and data processing machines. Key exports to Indonesia were electrical machinery, petroleum products and telecommunications apparatus, International Enterprise Singapore said.