Top 10 products imported by Malaysia

Among the top products imported by Malaysia in 2021 were electronic integrated circuits, in the first position, and petroleum oils (except crude oil), in the second position.

All merchandise imports to Malaysia totaled $238.321 billion in 2021, a growth of 26% year-on-year.

Treasure Global expects continued strong economic expansion in Malaysia, with the robust population growth and increasing level of urbanization.

Products imported

Up 28% y-o-y, Malaysian imports of electronic integrated circuits were $42.817 million in 2021.

Meanwhile, external purchases of petroleum oils, except crude oil, totaled $20.036 billion, a year-on-year rise of 50 percent.

Other products that Malaysians purchased the most from abroad were: gold ($4.21 billion, +87 percent), telephones ($4.19 billion, +7 percent) and diodes, transistors and similar semiconductor devices ($4.181 billion, +28 percent).

Market

According to the World Bank, Malaysia is likely to move from an upper-middle-income economy to a high-income economy between 2024 and 2028, reflecting the country’s economic transformation development trajectory in recent decades.

In fact, Malaysia’s gross national income per capita stands at $11,200 according to the latest estimates, just $1,335 below the current threshold that defines a high-income economy.

Other outstanding products in imports to Malaysia in 2021 include coal ($4,020 million, +75%), computers ($3,691 million, +45%), petroleum ($3,478 million, -24%), printed circuit boards ($3,099 million, +21%) and auto parts ($2,725 million, +26 percent).

According to the IMF, Malaysia’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth exceeded 4.3% on average between 2016 and 2019, but contracted 6.0% in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and is expected to post average growth of 5.7% over the next five years (including 2021).

Malaysia’s GDP amounted to US$337 billion in 2020 and is projected to reach approximately US$500 billion in 2025.

The United Nations Population Division estimates that the population of Southeast Asian countries in 2000 was around 525 million people, a figure that will increase to 668 million in 2020.

According to the World Bank, Malaysia recorded a population of about 32 million in 2020, up from 23 million in 2000.