"The manufacturing industry which contributed more than 75 percent (of the total exports) has broken the notion that our national exports fully comprise (unprocessed) commodities. This means that the downstream industry plays a role in increasing added value and our products are becoming competitive in the global market," Hartarto said in a statement released on Wednesday.
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The Central Statistics Agency (BPS) announced earlier that the volume of national exports in the first nine months of 2019 rose 7.57 percent to 482.1 million tons from 448.2 million tons in the same period last year.
The volume of non-oil/non-gas exports increased 9.9 percent to 462 million tons until the third quarter of 2019.
The agency noted that 10 products played a great role in achieving the target of non-oil/non-gas exports until September 2019, including animal/vegetable fats and oils, machines/electrical devices, vehicles and spare parts, iron and steel, and jewelry.
The others were rubber and rubber products, clothes which are not knitted, metal ore, crust and dust and processed foods.
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The 10 products contributed 40.51 percent of the country's total non-oil/non-gas exports.
In the January-September 2019 period, the country's balance of trade also recorded a surplus from the manufacturing industry, including the food industry with $11.8 million, garment industry at $5.6 million and the paper and paper products industry with $3 million
Meanwhile, leather, leather products, and the footwear industry recorded a trade surplus of $2.4 million, the furniture industry witnessed a trade surplus of $970 million, the tobacco processing industry saw a trade surplus of $424 thousand and the other processing industries recorded a trade surplus of $1.5 million.
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