South Korea’s exports rose 11.2 percent on-year in the first 10 days of January, data showed Thursday.

Outbound shipments reached US$15.44 billion in the Jan. 1-10 period, compared with $13.89 billion tallied a year earlier, according to the data from the Korea Customs Service.

After a yearlong downtrend, exports have logged on-year monthly gains from October last year. In December, exports went up 5.1 percent, though they fell 7.4 percent to come to $632.6 billion for the whole 2023.

The government expected exports, a key economic growth engine, to advance 8.5 percent this year to reach a record high of over $700 billion.

Source: Yonhap News Agency