*Nicaragua’s central bank (BCN) has released new figures which show that the country’s trade deficit in the first half of 2024 totalled US$1.24bn, up 60.1% on the same period in 2023. According to the BCN figures, the country’s exports in the first half of 2024 totalled US$3.95bn, down 0.9% on the same period in 2023, while imports totalled US$5.19bn, up 9.0%. The same figures showed that in the second quarter of 2024, exports totalled US$2.02bn, up 2.7% on the same quarter in 2023 while imports totalled US$2.65bn, up 6.1%, leaving a trade deficit of US$630.4m, up 19.0% on the same period in 2023. As regards Nicaragua’s main export markets, the US accounted for 36.5% of exports in the first half of 2024, followed by Canada (11.2%), El Salvador (9.8%), Mexico (5.2%), Costa Rica (4.7%), Belgium (4.7%), Guatemala (2.6%), Honduras (2.5%), and China (1.9%). Exports to Canada were up 78.6% in the first half of 2024 compared with the previous year, while exports to the US were down 14.9%.
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