New Delhi: The rising rupee has not been capable of getting much luster out of the country’s total export performance with exports recording a 18.91% expansion in August 2007 valued at $12.68 billion as against $10.66 billion of exports in August 2006.

In spite of some setback like textiles and leather, others like engineering, gems & jewellery and petroleum are still adding to the growth. The growth speed, however, is under the 41.4% rate filed in August 2006 as compared to the corresponding months in 2005.

According to FIEO approximations, the drop in exports in labour-intensive segments will result in eight million job losses in the recent year.

Ganesh Kumar Gupta, FIEO president said, “Around 3.5 million people have lost jobs.”

Imports filed an increase of 32.64% at $19.57 billion in August 2007 as compared to the similar month in the earlier year. The spiky development in imports registered in widening of trade deficit by 68.51% to $6.88 billion in the month.

For the April-August 2007 period, exports climbed up by 18.36 % to $59.48 billion from $ 50.26 billion in the same period of the preceding year. Exports filed a high 34.48% increase in April-August 2006.

In the April-August 2007 period, imports stood at $91.98 billion as compared to $70.18 billion in April-August 2006 filing a growth of 31.07%. Oil imports in August 2007 augmented by 19.52% to $6 billion that is 19.52% advanced than oil imports valued at $ 5 billion in the same period of the last year.

Oil imports were valued at $ 25.9 billion in April-August 2007, which was 8.32% higher than the oil imports worth $23.91 billion in the identical period of the previous year. Non-oil imports in August 2007 were figured at $13.55 billion recording a 39.57% growth over non-oil imports worth $9.7 billion in August 2006.

Non-oil imports in April-August 2007 stood at $ 66.08 billion that was 42.85% more than the level of such imports valued at $46.26 billion in April-August period of 2006. The trade deficit for April-August 2007 was calculated at $32.50 billion as compared to a shortfall of $19.92 billion in April-August 2006.