Proceedings of the 14th Meeting of
The COMCEC Trade Working Group
3
2. The COMCEC Trade Outlook
Mr. Ercan SAKA, Consultant to the COMCEC Coordination Office, has presented some of the key
findings of the COMCEC Trade Outlook 2019.
In his presentation, Mr. SAKA focused on the recent trends and main characteristics of the trade
between the OIC Member States and the world, recent trends in intra-OIC trade and trade
facilitation in the OIC Member States.
Concerning the trade between OIC Member states and the world, Mr. SAKA stated that total OIC
exports increased by 22 percent to 2 trillion $ in 2018. He mentioned that total OIC imports
increased by 4 per cent and amounted to 1.77 trillion $. Thus, he stated, the total OIC trade
increased from 3.0 trillion $ in 2017 to 3.77 trillion $ in 2018.
Mr. SAKA pointed out that several factors accounted for the performance in total OIC exports in
2018 including the revival of global economic activity and rising commodity prices. Mr. SAKA
also shared figures about total OIC trade, share of OIC trade in global trade and the breakdown
of total OIC exports and imports by countries and sectors.
He stated that top performers in total OIC exports were Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, United Arab
Emirates, Indonesia and Turkey with 60 percent of total OIC exports in 2018. Mineral fuels, oils,
electrical machinery and equipment, pearls, precious stones, mechanical appliance and plastics
represented 64 percent of the total OIC exports.
Mr. SAKA also stated that total OIC exports are highly concentrated. Accordingly, the share of
mineral fuels, oils and distillation products in total OIC exports was 42 percent in 2018. This
sector was followed by electrical machinery and equipment, pearls, precious stones, ores, slag
and ash and machinery, mechanical appliances. These five sectors as a whole accounted for 61
per cent of total OIC exports in 2018.
He also shared the figures about intra-OIC trade and commodity composition of intra-OIC
exports. He emphasized that although the intra-OIC trade remained weak in the last two years,
it rebounded strongly in 2017. Accordingly, intra-OIC trade increased by 18 per cent and
reached 323 billion dollars in 2017.
Mr. SAKA concluded his presentation by sharing figures on border compliance costs and times
for exports in the OIC Member States. He stated that border compliance costs and times vary
immensely across the member countries and reducing trade costs in the OIC member states is
an important issue to be more competitive in international markets.