All Peruvian metal exports collapsed in the first quarter of 2023

Peruvian metal exports reached US$2,422 million in February 2023, a negative variation of 28.9% compared to what was registered in February of the previous year (US$3,407 million).

According to the Mining Statistical Bulletin (BEM), prepared by the General Directorate for Mining Promotion and Sustainability of the Ministry of Energy and Mines (Minem), the value of metal mining exports in the first two months (US$5,012 million) registered a drop of 22 .8% compared to the same period in 2022 (US$6,490 million).

In detail, copper fell -27.6%; gold, -6.8%; zinc, -17.4%; silver, -9.3%; lead, -9.8%; tin, -76%; and iron, -9%. Only molybdenum recorded a significant advance of 85.8% between January and February.

This result is mainly due to the decrease in the international prices of copper, gold, zinc and molybdenum. The aforementioned metals have a joint participation of 46.5% of Peruvian exports.

“Nevertheless, Mining continues to be the activity that contributes the most to the country’s trade balance, as well as the main foreign exchange generator. In this sense, the representation of the mining subsector was 55% of total exports, which includes metallic (52.6%) and non-metallic (2.3%) minerals,” said Minem.

Copper: few export shipments

The value of copper exports in the first two months of the year was US$2,498 million, a decrease of 27.6% compared to the same period in 2022 (US$3,448 million), due to the decrease in the volume shipped (-17.2%) .

China remained the main destination for copper exports with 67.8% of the total, despite the decrease in the volume shipped in February 2023. It is followed by Japanin second place, with a participation of 6.1% and Germany, in third position with 4.7% of the total exported.