Tokyo — Japan posted a trade deficit of 2.79 trillion yen ($27.3 billion) in January, its largest ever monthly trade loss, amid growing fossil-fuel imports, the government said today.
A container ship sits berthed next to gantry cranes at a shipping terminal in Tokyo on Wednesday.
Japan's imports jumped 25% from a year earlier, to a record 8.04 trillion yen, while the value of exports rose 9.5% to 5.25 trillion yen, the Finance Ministry said in a preliminary report.
Japan has imported more petroleum and liquefied natural gas for power generation since the shutdown of nuclear reactors across the country following the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in 2011.
The falling yen and growing demand for energy have driven up import costs.
The yen has declined about 18% against the dollar since the start of 2013.
In January, Japan logged a record trade deficit of 1.04 trillion yen with China, up 59.2% from a year earlier.
Japan reported record imports of 1.91 trillion yen from China, its biggest trading partner, up 34.4% from a year earlier while shipments to the world's second-largest economy grew 13.1% to 862.6 yen.
The United States was the biggest market for Japanese exports in January as shipments rose 21.9% to 1.02 trillion yen, the 13th consecutive monthly rise, with car exports climbing 20.6% and those of general machinery up 19.4%.
Exports to the European Union grew 20.2% to 611.1 billion yen, for the eighth-straight month of increase, the ministry said.