Türkiye's exports in April increased marginally compared to the same month last year, the country's trade minister announced on Friday, citing preliminary data.

The imports during the month meanwhile also were up, resulting in the widening of the foreign trade gap.

The outbound shipments rose by 0.13% year-over-year to $19.3 billion, while the imports grew 4.2% year-over-year to $29.2 billion in April, the data showed.

"Our exports increased by 0.13% compared to the same month of 2023 and reached $19.27 billion. The most important reason for the slowdown in the annual increase rate is the calendar effect caused by the one-week Ramadan Bayram (Eid al-Fitr) holiday in April and the April 23 National Sovereignty and Children's Day holiday," Trade Minister Ömer Bolat said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

"However, our exports in April 2024 were the second-highest April exports historically," he added.

"Our imports increased by 4.2% on an annual basis in April and reached $29.17 billion. The increase in energy and precious metal imports resulting from the increase in global prices was effective in the increase in imports in April," he noted.

Consequently, the country's trade balance posted a deficit of $9.9 billion last month, surging 13.3% year-over-year. The foreign trade gap was at $7.3 billion in March.

The export-to-import coverage ratio in April was down 2.7 points from the same month last year to 66.1%. Excluding energy, the ratio of exports to imports was realized at 73.8% in April, the Trade Ministry's data showed.

The data revealed that Germany was the leading destination for Turkish exports last month with $1.5 billion followed by the U.S. with $1.2 billion and the United Kingdom at $1.1 billion.

In January-April, Türkiye's overseas shipments rose 2.7% from the prior year to $82.9 billion, the data showed.

Its imports declined 8.9% annually to $113.1 billion in the four months.

Like this, Türkiye's trade gap narrowed by 30.5% to $30.2 billion in the same period.