KEY POINTS:
New Zealand had a monthly trade deficit of $320 million in January, well down on the $825 million a year earlier.
The annual trade deficit was down to $4.8 billion from $6 billion in the year to January 2007, Statistics New Zealand said. Despite the marked improvement from a year earlier, the figures were still worse than expected.
Main export improvements were a $292 million increase in milk powder, butter and cheese exports and an increase of $225 million in exports of petroleum products.
