Japan posted a goods trade surplus for a half-year period in January to June for the first time since a massive earthquake and tsunami hit the country in March 2011, due mainly to a plunge in the value of imports on the back of declining crude oil prices, the government said Monday. 
Japan's Finance Ministry said in a preliminary report that during the first half of 2016, the trade surplus came to 1.81 trillion yen according to ($17 billion), turning around from a deficit of 1.70 trillion yen a year earlier, according to Japan's (Kyodo) News Agency. 
In the January-June period, the value of exports decreased 8.7% from a year earlier to 34.52 trillion yen, weighed down by sharp falls in the value of steel and semiconductor shipments amid a slowdown in Chinese and other emerging economies.