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Nittsu Research Institute and Consulting, Inc. (NRIC) projected in late 2019 that a total of 12.85 million TEUs of containers (loaded) will be imported to and exported from Japan in fiscal 2019 (April 2019-March 2020), which would 1.2% from the previous fiscal year.
NRIC anticipated that Japan will import 7.544 million TEUs, increasing a mild 0.9% year on year. Due to sluggishness in the growth of personal spending, consumer goods, such as foodstuffs and garments, will either level off or swell slightly. Owing to a slowdown from a year earlier in the expansion of capital investments, parts for producing machinery, equipment and components will not increase as powerfully as they did in fiscal 2018. As for consumer goods, there will be a last-minute rise in demand in the first half, or before a hike in the consumption tax rate, but in the entire fiscal year, they will either remain unchanged or just improve moderately. The growth in production goods will be decelerated. In the second half, the research instituted forecast that imports will decrease from a year earlier, being unable to avoid downward pressure from a fall in demand after the consumption tax rate is raised.
As for exports from Japan, meanwhile, NRIC foresaw that those to the U.S., China and other newly industrialized economies will slow down more vividly in the second half. The institute feared the trade friction between the U.S. and China will be prolonged, exercising more powerful adverse impacts that could decelerate their own economies Regarding auto parts and components, those to China and ASEAN nations will remain robust, but those to the U.S. will be stagnant. If the U.S. imposes additional auto tariffs, NRIC said there could be downward pressure. In respect to commodities other than machinery, chemical products and plastic will both either remain unchanged or only increase slightly.
