Bauxite producers in Jamaica experienced losses in May as a result of the Jamaican dollar losing value to the US currency.
That's according to data published by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica-STATIN in its Producer Price Index report.
The Index measures the average change in selling prices received by domestic producers of goods and services.
The report showed that Mining and Quarrying declined by 1.8 per cent.
STATIN says the fall was mainly due to the currency slide.
That resulted in a negative movement of 1.9 per cent in the Bauxite Mining & Alumina Processing group.
However, STATIN reported that Other Mining and Quarrying activities recorded a positive movement of 0.9 percent for the same period.
Manufacturing was also up 1.7 per cent in May.
Meanwhile, STATIN is reporting that Jamaica’s trade deficit at the end of April was at US$1.4 billion .
This was an increase of 20.7 per cent when compared to the US$1.1 billion U recorded during the same period in 2017.
Meanwhile the April International Merchandise Trade Bulletin further outlined that expenditure on imports amounted to US$1.9 billion for the review period, 20.9 per cent higher over the corresponding period in 2017.
Revenue from total exports was up 21.6 per cent when compared to the US$448.8 million recorded last year.
Expenditure on imports from the US-- Jamaica’s main trading partner -- was valued at US$833.5 million for the January to April period, an increase of 13.5 per cent.
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