Sorong – Bank Indonesia assesses the economy in West Papua Province and Southwest Papua Province in the second quarter experienced growth of 21.11 percent year-over-year (yoy), accelerating significantly compared to economic growth in the first quarter of 2024 which only grew 2.27 percent (yoy).
Bank Indonesia said economic growth in two provinces in the western Papua region was driven by business fields (LUs) such as processing industry, mining and trade. Especially in Southwest Papua province, BI explained that the biggest contributor to economic growth was the trade sector.
In contrast to the data submitted by Bank Indonesia, the West Papua Central Bureau of Statistics (BPS) said the trade business field in Southwest Papua province experienced a decline in the second quarter of 2024. BPS explained that Southwest Papua’s exports in June 2024 fell 82.91 percent compared to May 2024, from US$ 5.12 million to US$ 0.88 million.
According to BPS records, fish and shrimp (HS03) is the category of goods that has the largest export value in Southwest Papua in June 2024, amounting to US$ 0.57 million or 65.14 percent of total Southwest Papua exports with the destination country of the United States with an export value of US$ 0.21 million with a contribution of 24.48 percent.
Meanwhile, Southwest Papua’s trade balance in June 2024 experienced a surplus of US$ 0.88 million. When viewed from the volume of Southwest Papua’s trade balance, it also experienced a surplus of 0.22 thousand tons.