MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Latinamerican trade surplus with US tops 100 billion

With oil exporters Venezuela and Mexico leading, Latin America and the Caribbean posted a 100.8 billion US dollars trade surplus with the United States in 2005, up 32.2% percent from the previous year, reported Friday the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Latin America and the Caribbean accounted for 17.5% of all goods and services imported by the United States, up slightly from its 17% share of 2004. But the region accounted for a significantly lower percentage of U.S. exports, 13.2%, compared to 21% in 2005.

Venezuela's trade surplus with the United States rose to 27.6 billion last year, compared with 20.2 billion in 2004. Mexico jumped to a 50.1 billion surplus in 2005 from 45 billion the previous year. Brazil's trade surplus in 2005 was up almost 2 billion to 9.1 billion, and Argentina posted 472 million US dollars surplus compared with 357 million in 2004.

The United States 2005 overall trade deficit was 725.8 billion in 2005, almost 18% more than in 2004. While exports have climbed, they have struggled to keep up as record oil prices, strong consumer demand and cheap foreign goods boosted imports.

In December, US exports rose by 2.1% to 111.5 billion, as imports increased by 1.9% to 177.2 billion with the deficit reaching 65.7 billion up from November's 64.7 billion.

The trade gap with China jumped 25% to a record 201.6 billion US dollars.