Macao's trade deficit for the first three quarters of 2010 widened by 27.5 percent over the same period of last year to 26.61 billion patacas (3.3 billion U.S. dollars), according to the figures released on Friday by the city' s Statistics and Census Service (DSEC).

From January to September 2010, the combined value of local merchandise import and export amounted to 37.18 billion patacas (4. 64 billion dollars), up by 14.7 percent compared with the same period of 2009, the figures indicated.

Total value of merchandise export fell by 8.4 percent year-on- year to 5.29 billion patacas (661 million dollars), while that of import grew by 19.7 percent to 31.89 billion patacas (3.98 billion dollars), the figures indicated.

Analyzed by destination of exports, value of merchandise export to Hong Kong increased by five percent year-on-year in the period and that to the Chinese mainland remained unchanged. Meanwhile, that value of merchandise export to the United States and the European Union decreased substantially by 43.5 percent and 40.7 percent respectively.

Exports of Textile and garment amounted to 1.24 billion patacas (155 million dollars), down substantially by 39.6 percent year-on- year to account for 23.5 percent of the total merchandise export. The value of Non-textile exports grew by 8.9 percent to 4.04 billion patacas (505 million dollars) in the period.

Regarding the country of origin of imported goods, value of merchandise import from the Chinese mainland and the EU expanded by 17.2 percent and 26.8 percent respectively year-on-year, according to the DSEC.

The exports/imports ratio went down by 5.1 percentage points year-on-year to 16.6 percent in the period.