Page 118 - Contributed Paper Session (CPS) - Volume 4

CPS2145 Jee, Hui-Siang Brenda et al.
The positive or negative value of index from this formula is interpreted as:

(i) If reported exports is smaller than reported imports (positive value), A
is under-reporting exports to B or B is over-reporting imports from A;
(ii) If reported exports is greater than reported imports (negative value), A
is over-reporting exports to B or B is under-reporting imports from A.

3. Result
3.1 Results

Figure 1 presented the results for bilateral trade discrepancy index. The
figure showed that there was a gap between exports and imports data of LNG
reported by Sarawak and Japan. From the year 2008 to 2017, Sarawak as the
exporter of LNG to Japan had resulted in positive value of indexes. In other
words, the reported export by Sarawak is less than the reported imports by
Japan. This implies whether Sarawak was under-reporting its exports to Japan
or Japan was over-reporting its imports from Sarawak.

Figure 1: Sarawak-Japan LNG Trade and Trade Discrepancy Index, 2008-2017

USD billion %
16.0 16.0
14.0 14.0 13.5 13.3 13.2 14.0
12.8
12.7
12.0 12.6 13.3
11.6
12.0 12.0
11.2
10.0 10.0
8.7 8.5 8.7
8.3
8.0
8.0 7.5 7.5 8.0
6.2 6.7 6.1
6.0 5.3 4.9 5.5 5.6 6.0
4.8
4.7 5.0
4.0 4.0
3.3 3.4
2.0 2.0
- -
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Year
Japan's LNG Imports from Sarawak Sarawak's LNG Exports to Japan Trade Discrepancy Index

Source: Department of Statistics Malaysia, Ministry of Finance Japan and International Monetary Fund.
Throughout the analysis, trade discrepancy indexes were in the range of
3.0% to 14.0%. The index for the year 2008, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 showed
relatively low trade discrepancies, which was 5.0% or lower. Meanwhile, in the
year 2010 and 2017, the discrepancy index was moderate at the range of 6.0%
to 8.0%. The discrepancy index was relatively large in year 2009, 2015 and
2016, in between 10.0% to 14.0%. However, according to Gehlhar (1996), it is
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