While the European Union continued to record growth in exports and imports with countries outside the EU in Q1 2018, albeit dropping to just 1.5 percent year-on-year, the latest data on trade in goods shows that Croatia is no longer among member countries with the largest growth in exports, posting instead a 3 percent drop in the same period.

In the first three months on 2018 Croatia was among the few EU member states where value of exports fell in year-on-year terms, warned the Croatian Chamber of Economy (HGK). In fact, with a 3 percent drop in exports, Croatia recorded the biggest single drop in Q1 2018 among EU28 countries, followed by Denmark and Luxembourg with a 2 percent drop each, and Spain and the United Kingdom with 1 percent, Poslovni Dnevnik reported on Monday.

According to data released by Eurostat, the total value of European exports in Q1 2017 rose by 13 percent year-on-year, before slowing down to just 1.5 percent in Q1 2018. Meanwhile, the growth of imports in the same periods fell from 13.4 percent to 0.8 percent in the first three months of 2018.

“A significant factor which influenced this change in trade balance were energy prices, especially the price of crude oil,” said HGK, and added that over the first quarter of 2017 the average price of Brent crude oil shot up by 55 percent, which led to import prices of oil in the euro zone jump by 65 percent.

Pricier oil had an effect on prices of other energy sources and some raw materials, which resulted in higher import prices in the mining and extraction industries, but also in the processing industry, where they rose by 3.5 percent.

“Of course, this change in prices did not only affect the value of imports, but was also reflected in the growth of the value of exports,” HGK said. The price of oil continued to grow this year, albeit at a slower pace, so the rise in all other prices was lower than in 2017, or even dropped due to the rising exchange rate of the euro. Import prices in the processing industry fell by 0.4 percent, as euro gained ground against the dollar by about 15 percent, reducing the value of some of the trade balance.

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