(Insider Stories) - The trade balance recorded a deficit in April as oil and gas imports reached $1.2 billion and non-oil and gas imports $407 million, brining the January-April trade balance to a $1.85 billion deficit.

“The deficit in national trade in the January-April period was caused by the deficit in oil and gas trade that reached $4.6 billion, and was exacerbated by a shrinking of the surplus in non-oil and gas trade to $3.1 billion from $2.7 billion,” Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan says in a statement.  

The biggest trading partners were India, the U.S., the Netherlands, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Turkey, Spain, Egypt and Pakistan.