Uganda continues to earn big from non-coffee items like beans, tea and mineral products among others.
The Ministry of Finance has revealed that the country earned US$455.22 (Shs1.620Trn) in exports in the month of May 2021.
The revelation is contained in the Monthly Performance Of The Economy Report June 2021 that was published recently in which the Ministry revealed that export receipts increased by 6.7% to USD 455.22 million in May 2021 from USD426.56 million in April 2021.
Government attributed the increase in export volumes on the mainly non-coffee exports such as mineral products, electricity, tea, beans among others due to increase in their respective volumes.
The Middle East remained Uganda’s top destination for merchandise exports in May 2021 accounting for 42.7% of total exports. However, this is a slight decline compared to the share (44.3%) recorded in May 2020. Other major destinations included the EAC (25.6%), Rest of Africa (13.64%) and the European Union (11.62%).
However, Uganda registered huge volumes of imports, increasing by 11.7% from USD695.81 Million in April 2021 to USD 777.39 million about Shs2.796Trn in May 2021. Similarly, the
value of imports during the month represents a 78.5% rise as compared to the same period last year.
The Finance Ministry attributed to increases in both Government and private sector imports due to improvements in global supply chains following ease of the lockdown measures that had been put in place to contain the spread of COVID-19 back in May 2020.
Additionally, Government imports increased during the month as a result of an increase in Government project imports.
Asia remained the main source of Uganda’s imports increasing its share from 32% a year ago to 35.3% in May 2021. The EAC and Middle East came in second and thirdaccounting for 28.5% and 11.8%, respectively.
On a country specific level, Uganda mainly sourced her imports from Tanzania which accounted for 19.2% of the total imports bill in May 2021.
This was followed by China, India, Kenya and the United Arab Emirates which accounted for 15.0%, 9.6%, 9.2% and 7.9% of total imports, respectively.
