It appears that Korea-US FTA has supported exports to the US a lot amid difficult surroundings. After FTA Information & Business Support Center analyzed statistics for import customs clearance released by the US's International Trade Commission, Korea's exports to the US during the first half of this year came out to be 29,465 million$, up 5.4% from last year's 27,953 million.

This is the result from increasing trend of export in items standing to benefit from FTA such as automobiles(including auto parts), machinery and textiles.

Electronic goods and petroleum products, on the other hand, which  has relatively low advantages of Korea-US FTA due to low customs tariff, showed signs of decline. Looking at the rate of rise and fall by export items, automobiles(plus auto parts) △34.5%, steel products △29.1%, rubber goods △16.8%, machinery △14.8%, agricultural and fishery products △8.9% whereas petroleum products and electronic goods showed ▽15.7% and ▽22.4% each.

The export's proportion involved with FTA accounted for 58.3% in April, 63.8% in May and then up 5.4% to 69.2% in June, which has been indicating continuous upturn since the effectuation of Korea-US FTA on 15 March 2012.

The fact reflects that Korea's industry is reinforcing overseas marketing activities by using FTA even in the difficult export conditions.

With regards to FTA related proportion in export items in June, auto parts industry recorded 67.7%, up 3.2% from the previous month. It has been an upturn for 3 consecutive months. Surprisingly tire products reached 99.8% while textile products kept almost the same level.

Meantime, FTA proportion of petroleum products and electronic goods that decreased in exports in the first half showed respectively 39.6% and 62.3%, which is obviously below average.

Considering deteriorating export conditions through worldwide recession and slow economic growth in the US, FTA Information & Business Support Center plans to support overseas marketing campaign of domestics companies.

English edition brochures designed to publicize FTA related activities of Korean companies to the buyers abroad is to be made in the course of October. Further, separate counselling service table will be provided during the export counselling session and presentation meeting while strengthening one-stop service to promote on/off line FTA consulting.