December 2024 issue of "Hong Kong Monthly Digest of Statistics" now available
The Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) published today (December 16) the December 2024 issue of the "Hong Kong Monthly Digest of Statistics" (HKMDS).
Apart from providing up-to-date statistics, this issue also contains two feature articles entitled "The Four Key Industries in the Hong Kong Economy" and "Analysis of Hong Kong's External Merchandise Trade by Industry".
"The Four Key Industries in the Hong Kong Economy"
The Government has been actively pursuing economic development in order to keep up the competitive advantage of Hong Kong. The traditional Four Key Industries in Hong Kong, namely financial services, tourism, trading and logistics, and professional and producer services, have been the driving force of Hong Kong's economic growth, providing impetus to growth of other sectors and creating employment.
This feature article analyses the economic contribution and employment situation in respect of the Four Key Industries in 2023. Taken together, the share of the total value added of the Four Key Industries in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 57.1%, while the percentage share of total employment was 42.4%.
For enquiries about this feature article, please contact the National Income Branch (2) of the C&SD (Tel: 3903 7002; email: gdp-p@censtatd.gov.hk).
"Analysis of Hong Kong's External Merchandise Trade by Industry"
The C&SD has compiled a set of statistics on trade by industry of importers/exporters in order to provide insights into the external merchandise trading activities of individual industries.
In 2023, "transportation, storage, postal and courier services" and "import/export and wholesale trades" were the two major industries, together contributing about 92% of the total trade value. On the export side, the contribution of small and medium sized enterprises in these two industries was 52% and 62% of their respective exports.
This feature article also presents further analyses of imports and exports of major industries by major trading partner and major commodity group.
For enquiries about this feature article, please contact the Trade Analysis Section of the C&SD (Tel: 2582 4914; email: trade@censtatd.gov.hk).
Published in bilingual form, the HKMDS is a compact volume of official statistics containing about 130 tables. It collects up-to-date statistical series on various aspects of the social and economic situation of Hong Kong. Topics include population; labour; external trade; National Income and Balance of Payments; prices; business performance; energy; housing and property; government accounts, finance and insurance; and transport, communications and tourism. For selected key statistical items, over 20 charts depicting the annual trend in the past decade and quarterly or monthly trend in the recent two years are also available. Users can download the Digest at the website of the C&SD (www.censtatd.gov.hk/en/EIndexbySubject.html?pcode=B1010002&scode=460).
Enquiries about the contents of the Digest can be directed to the Statistical Information Dissemination Section (1) of the C&SD (Tel: 2582 4738; email: gen-enquiry@censtatd.gov.hk).
Volume and price statistics of external merchandise trade in October 2024
Further to the external merchandise trade statistics in value terms for October 2024 released earlier on, the Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) released today (December 16) the volume and price statistics of external merchandise trade for that month.
In October 2024, the volume of Hong Kong's total exports of goods and imports of goods increased by 0.3% and 1.5% respectively over October 2023.
Comparing the first ten months of 2024 with the same period in 2023, the volume of Hong Kong's total exports of goods and imports of goods increased by 5.8% and 3.3% respectively.
Comparing the three-month period ending October 2024 with the preceding three months on a seasonally adjusted basis, the volume of total exports of goods and imports of goods decreased by 4.5% and 0.5% respectively.
Changes in volume of external merchandise trade are derived from changes in external merchandise trade value with the effect of price changes discounted.
Comparing October 2024 with October 2023, the prices of total exports of goods and imports of goods increased by 3.4% and 3.0% respectively.
As regards price changes in the first ten months of 2024 over the same period in 2023, the prices of total exports of goods and imports of goods increased by 3.8% and 3.3% respectively.
Price changes in external merchandise trade are reflected by changes in unit value indices of external merchandise trade, which are compiled based on average unit values or, for certain commodities, specific price data.
The terms of trade index is derived from the ratio of price index of total exports of goods to that of imports of goods. Compared with the same periods in 2023, the index increased by 0.4% in October 2024 and 0.5% in the first ten months of 2024.
Changes in the unit value and volume of total exports of goods by main destination are shown in Table 1.
Comparing October 2024 with October 2023, increases were recorded for the total export volume to Vietnam (29.9%), the mainland of China (the Mainland) (4.4%) and the USA (1.0%). On the other hand, the total export volume to Taiwan (-3.4%) and India (-34.0%) decreased.
Over the same period of comparison, the total export prices to the USA (4.4%), the Mainland (4.3%), Taiwan (3.6%) and Vietnam (1.7%) increased. On the other hand, the total export prices to India decreased by 1.0%.
Changes in the unit value and volume of imports of goods by main supplier are shown in Table 2.
Comparing October 2024 with October 2023, increases were recorded for the import volume from Taiwan (11.4%), Singapore (10.5%), Japan (6.3%) and the Mainland (0.7%). On the other hand, the import volume from Korea decreased by 13.1%.
Over the same period of comparison, the import prices from all main suppliers increased: Korea (6.8%), Singapore (5.9%), Taiwan (5.1%), the Mainland (2.1%) and Japan (1.0%).
Further information
Details of the above statistics are published in the October 2024 issue of "Hong Kong Merchandise Trade Index Numbers". Users can browse and download the report at the website of the C&SD (www.censtatd.gov.hk/en/EIndexbySubject.html?pcode=B1020006&scode=230).
Enquiries on merchandise trade indices may be directed to the Trade Analysis Section of the C&SD (Tel: 2582 4918).
