This led to many new record highs, including export values for the month, quarter, and year for the grouping milk powder, butter, and cheese.
“For 2013, the value of goods we exported rose by $2.0 billion – to reach $48.1b – and most of this increase was from milk powder,” industry and labour statistics manager Louise Holmes-Oliver said. “Almost half of our milk powder exports went to China.”
Goods exported to China in the year ended December 2013 were valued at $10.0b, of which $4.0b was milk powder. This is the highest-ever value of milk powder exported to China for any year.
“China became our top annual export destination in 2013, a spot Australia had held since the year ended September 1989,” Holmes-Oliver said.
“For imports, China’s been our main partner since December 2011.”
Imports for the December 2013 year were up $1.1b to $48.3b.
For the December 2013 quarter, seasonally adjusted exports rose 10% to $13.4b.
Seasonally adjusted imports fell 2.8% to $12.3b from the September 2013 quarter.
The seasonally adjusted trade balance for the December 2013 quarter was a surplus of $1.1 billion.
This is the first surplus over $1.0b since the series began.
For the December 2013 month, export values increased 16% to $658 million compared with December 2012.
Imports increased 19% to $669m.
The trade balance for the December 2013 month was a surplus of $523m.
