Colombia ran up a trade surplus of $161.6 million in October as exports jumped 30.2 percent during the month helped by high oil prices, government data showed on Friday. The country's trade surplus totalled $897.3 million during the first 10 months of 2004, the government's National Statistics Department said in a news release.

This compared to a surplus of $94.2 billion from January to October 2003.

Exports jumped to $1.51 billion in October, compared to $1.16 billion in the same month of 2003. In the first 10 months of the year exports totalled $13.39 billion, up 23.2 percent from the equivalent period last year.

Colombia's exports have been boosted by rising prices for oil and commodities such as coffee, ferro nickel and coal.

The value of these exports rose by 22.5 percent in the first 10 months of the year to $6.19 billion, although the volume shipped actually fell by 4.9 percent.

But "non-traditional" exports, which include bananas, flowers, leather goods, confectioneries, auto parts, textiles and confectioneries, also performed strongly. Sales have been boosted by economic recovery in key trade partner Venezuela, which is a big customer of Colombian vehicles, auto parts and livestock.

This category grew by 23.9 percent to $7.20 billion in the first 10 months of 2004. The growth came despite a sharp appreciation of the peso against the US dollar, which Colombian authorities have tried to stop with dollar purchases and capital controls.

Imports reached $12.49 billion in the first 10 months of the year, up from $10.77 billion from January to October 2003.

Copyright Reuters, 2005