MANILA, March 12 (Xinhua) -- China was the Philippines' biggest supplier of imports with 22.2 percent share of the total imports in January 2019, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said on Tuesday.

"Import bills to this country posted an increase of 24.5 percent or an amount of 2.01 billion U.S. dollars, from 1.61 billion U.S. dollars in January 2018," the PSA said.

South Korea was placed second with an import value of 789.56 million U.S. dollars in January 2019 or a share of 8.7 percent, the PSA said, adding that imports from this country decreased by 12.3 percent, from 899.99 million U.S. dollars in January 2018.

The PSA said Japan ranked the third, contributing 8.7 percent or an import value of 789.00 million U.S. dollars in January 2019. This recorded a decrement of 6.2 percent from the January 2018 value, amounting to 840.75 million U.S. dollars, the PSA added.

The PSA said the United States came fourth with a 7.2 percent share of the total import bills in January 2019. "Its total import bills contracted by 7.3 percent, from 701.65 million U.S. dollars in January 2018 to 650.68 million U.S. dollars in January 2019," the PSA said.

Thailand came the fifth with imports valued at 602.67 million U.S. dollars in the past January or a share of 6.7 percent. Import bills from this country increased by 11.7 percent, from 539.65 million U.S. dollars in January 2018, the PSA said.

Philippines' total external trade in goods in January 2019 reached 14.31 billion U.S. dollars, reflecting an increase of 2.9 percent from the 13.91 billion U.S. dollars recorded value in January 2018, according to PSA.

Of the total external trade, the PSA said 5.28 billion U.S. dollars or 36.9 percent were exported goods and 9.03 billion U.S. dollars or 63.1 percent were imported goods.

Furthermore, the PSA said the Philippines' balance of trade in goods (BoT-G) increased to a 3.76 billion U.S. dollars deficit in January 2019, from 3.16 billion U.S. dollars deficit in January 2018.