OCTOBER KEY FIGURES

	August 2008	September 2008	October 2008
	$m	$m	$m
Food and live animals	634	747	821
Beverages and tobacco	123	179	195
Crude materials, inedible, except fuels	268	245	312
Mineral fuels, lubricants and related materials	2 784	3 334	3 552
Animal and vegetable oils, fats and waxes	57	70	52
Chemicals and related products, nes	1 979	2 107	2 332
Manufactured goods classified chiefly by material	2 050	2 382	2 675
Machinery and transport equipment	7 429	7 477	8 080
Miscellaneous manufactured articles	2 267	2 901	2 929
Commodities and transactions not classified elsewhere in the SITC	812	1 505	956
TOTAL	18 403	20 945	21 906

OCTOBER KEY POINTS


ORIGINAL ESTIMATES

• In original terms, the October 2008 merchandise imports were $21,906m, an increase of $961m (5%) on the revised September 2008 merchandise imports of $20,945m.

PRELIMINARY BALANCE OF PAYMENTS GOODS IMPORTS

• Preliminary analysis shows that goods imports (debits) on a balance of payments basis increased by $109m (1%) in seasonally adjusted terms between September and October 2008. Intermediate and other merchandise goods rose $354m (4%) with fuels and lubricants, up $287m (9%) and Consumption goods rose $153m (3%). Capital goods fell $234m (5%) mainly driven by the civil aircraft component. Other goods fell $165m (13%) with non-monetary gold down $160m (16%).

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
November 2008	17 December 2008
December 2008	19 January 2009
January 2009	18 February 2009
February 2009	19 March 2009
March 2009	21 April 2009
April 2009	20 May 2009

INTRODUCTION

This publication presents statistics of Australia's merchandise imports classified according to the broadest level (1 digit sections) of the United Nations Standard International Trade Classification. The data are compiled from information submitted by importers or their agents to the Australian Customs Service. For more details see International Merchandise Trade, Australia: Concepts, Sources and Methods (cat. no. 5489.0) on the ABS web site. More detailed merchandise imports data are available on the ABS web site www.abs.gov.au from the Downloads tab of this issue or by contacting the National Information and Referral Service.


INQUIRIES

For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070 or Selvi Sekhar on Canberra (02) 6252 5540.