More goods were exported from the State last July than in the entire year of 1980, according to the latest statistics.

Provisional Central Statistics Office figures said exports in July reached the highest monthly rate yet recorded at £4.56 billion (€5.79 billion), £170 million more than the previous month. Some £2.74 billion worth of goods were imported during the month.

Figures show the trade surplus increasing by 35 per cent in the first half of the year on the comparable period in 1998, with £8.2 billion in exports exceeding imports by £2.1 billion.

The figures show a 20 per cent rise in exports to the US in the first half of the year to £3.58 billion. The Minister of State for Labour, Trade and Consumer Affairs, Mr Tom Kitt, said the US had overtaken Germany as the State's second-largest individual export market.