The Bank of Tanzania (BOT) Monthly Economic Review–April 2016 recently published shows that the value of export of goods and services in the year ending March 2016 increased by +8.7%.
Overall exports reached USD9,879.1m, compared with USD9090.3m in the year ending March 2015.
The improvement was mainly driven by an increase in travel (tourism) receipts, gold and manufactured goods.
Travel maintained the leading position among foreign currency earners, before manufactured goods, gold and traditional exports, with USD2,289.6m worth of exports in the year ending March 2016, showing a year-on-year increase of +8.1%.
Gold exports increased by +4.3% to USD1,320.2m as a result of increase in export volume.
Foreign exchange earnings from manufactured goods increased by 3% to USD1,408.2m in the year ending March 2016, with a notable improvement recorded in sisal products, textile apparels, and plastic goods.
Among Tanzania’s traditional exports, increases were seen in coffee (USD150.6m, +4.9%), tea (USD47.2m, +11.6%), cloves (USD44.4m,  +39.6%) and sisal (USD29.3m, +65.5%).
There was also a notable rise in export value of oil seeds, raw hides and skins, cocoa, cereals, and re-exports of machinery, vehicles, wheat and tyres.
Commodities Prices
In March 2016, prices of coffee, gold and crude oil went up, thanks to higher global demand, reaching USD1.67 per kg of Robusta coffee and USD3.47 of Arabica, USD37.34 per barrel of crude oil, and USD1,245.14 per troy ounce of gold.
The price of crude oil rose mainly due to expected decrease in oil supply following the agreement by Saudi Arabia and Russia to freeze production.
The price of gold rose together with the investors’ increasing demand for this metal seen as safe haven under volatile global equity markets.