Tunisia’s trade balance deficit reached a historic record at 21.3 billion dinars at the end of October, against 13.3 billion during the ten months of 2021, i.e. a worsening of 8 billion dinars (+ 60%). Consequently, the coverage rate fell by 5.1 percentage points to stand at 68.9%.
This deficit remains largely explained by the deficit recorded with certain countries, such as China (-7.3 billion dinars), Turkey (-3.3 billion), Algeria (-2.9 billion), Russia (-2.4 billion), as well as Italy (-1.9 billion), and Spain (-0.7 billion).
Excluding energy, the trade balance deficit is reduced to 13.4 billion dinars. Indeed, the energy balance deficit stands at 7.9 billion dinars (37.2% of the total deficit) against 4 billion during the ten months of the year 2021.
According to data published today Thursday, November 10, 2022, by the National Institute of Statistics (INS), exports increased by 24.9% to 47.3 billion dinars, against 37.8 billion at the end of October 2021.
As for imports, they increased by 34% to stand at 68.6 billion dinars, against 51.2 billion during the ten months of the past year. This increase in imports comes from the increase in purchases of energy products (+83.6), raw materials and semi-finished products (+41.9%), capital goods (+13.7 %), as well as consumer goods (+14.7%).
With regard to the increase observed in exports during the ten months of 2022, sales of the energy sector (+59.9%), those of mines, phosphates, and derivatives (+70.7% ), those of the agro-food industries (+33.9%), those of textiles, clothing, and leather (+21.6%) and those of the mechanical and electrical industries (+14.1%).
