Imports fell 4.2 percent on-year last month to $42.4 billion.

The country's trade surplus came to $1.72 billion in August, marking 91 straight months in which the country's exports have exceeded imports, according to the ministry.

The trade surplus, however, narrowed sharply from $6.8 billion posted last year and $2.4 billion posted in July.

"The growing trade feud between the United States and China, along with Japan's export curbs and the Hong Kong crisis sparked uncertainties in the global business environment," Industry Minister Sung Yun-mo said.

Amid the escalating trade row between Washington and Beijing -- its top two trading partners -- South Korea's exports to China decreased 21.3 percent on-year last month, with those to the US also dropping 6.7 percent, the data showed.

Exports of petrochemical goods to China fell last month due to slower growth in the world's No.2 economy, the ministry said.

Demand for auto parts also fell in the US following the decreased production of cars by the world's top economy.

Outbound shipments of chips, a key export item for Asia's fourth-largest economy, continued to slide, nosediving 30.7 percent in August from a year earlier on low prices of memory chips.

Outbound shipments of petrochemical products sank 19.2 percent amid the global uncertainties, according to the ministry.

Shipments of automobiles, on the other hand, advanced 4.6 percent over the cited period, marking the fifth consecutive month of on-year growth.

Following the efforts to diversify its export portfolio, outbound shipments to Southeast Asia edged up 1.9 percent, it added.

Exports to Japan, meanwhile, fell 6.2 percent on-year in August amid the growing trade row between the two Asian neighbors, having a limited impact on the overall outbound shipments.

Tokyo implemented export restrictions on three key industrial materials against Seoul in July, which came in response to Seoul's Supreme Court rulings against Japanese firms from last year over wartime forced labor.

"As there are also no cases in which the restrictions of the three materials jolted the production of goods here, the curb had a limited impact on South Korea's overall exports," the ministry said in a statement.

The data came amid growing concerns that the Korean economy may miss its growth target for the year. The finance ministry cut its growth outlook by 0.2-percentage point to a range of between 2.4 percent and 2.5 percent, and the Bank of Korea trimmed its own to 2.2 percent from 2.5 percent, citing increased uncertainty.

But Finance Minister Hong Nam-ki said earlier it would not be easy to attain the revised growth target for the year.

South Korea's economy contracted 0.4 percent in the first quarter from three months earlier, marking the worst performance since the 2008-09 global financial crisis. In the second quarter of the year, the economy rebounded by growing 1.1 percent on-quarter.

Some private economic institutes forecast that Asia's fourth-largest economy may grow in the lower end of 2 percent this year in the face of a slump in exports. (Yonhap)