European Union - Merchandise imports from low- and middle-income economies outside region (% of total merchandise imports)

Merchandise imports from low- and middle-income economies outside region (% of total merchandise imports) in European Union was 21.27 as of 2020. Its highest value over the past 60 years was 23.43 in 2012, while its lowest value was 10.10 in 1988.

Definition: Merchandise imports from low- and middle-income economies outside region are the sum of merchandise imports by the reporting economy from other low- and middle-income economies in other World Bank regions according to the World Bank classification of economies. Data are expressed as a percentage of total merchandise imports by the economy. Data are computed only if at least half of the economies in the partner country group had non-missing data.

Source: World Bank staff estimates based data from International Monetary Fund's Direction of Trade database.

See also:

Year Value
1960 16.94
1961 16.10
1962 16.08
1963 15.84
1964 16.04
1965 15.78
1966 15.84
1967 15.37
1968 15.02
1969 14.46
1970 13.54
1971 12.86
1972 12.39
1973 12.82
1974 16.31
1975 14.68
1976 14.95
1977 15.46
1978 14.53
1979 14.85
1980 15.52
1981 13.95
1982 15.06
1983 15.42
1984 15.82
1985 15.72
1986 11.12
1987 10.46
1988 10.10
1989 10.44
1990 10.57
1991 10.55
1992 10.87
1993 13.60
1994 13.92
1995 13.35
1996 13.82
1997 13.72
1998 12.91
1999 12.98
2000 14.73
2001 14.92
2002 14.97
2003 15.68
2004 16.41
2005 18.43
2006 19.62
2007 19.97
2008 21.68
2009 20.50
2010 22.47
2011 23.07
2012 23.43
2013 22.77
2014 22.27
2015 21.33
2016 20.65
2017 21.37
2018 21.89
2019 21.72
2020 21.27

Development Relevance: Although global integration has increased, low- and middle-income economies still face trade barriers when accessing other markets.

Limitations and Exceptions: Data on exports and imports are from the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) Direction of Trade database and should be broadly consistent with data from other sources, such as the United Nations Statistics Division's Commodity Trade (Comtrade) database. All high-income economies and major low- and middle-income economies report trade data to the IMF on a timely basis, covering about 85 percent of trade for recent years. Trade data for less timely reporters and for countries that do not report are estimated using reports of trading partner countries. Therefore, data on trade between developing and high-income economies should be generally complete. But trade flows between many low- and middle-income economies - particularly those in Sub-Saharan Africa - are not well recorded, and the value of trade among low- and middle-income economies may be understated.

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Private Sector & Trade Indicators

Sub-Topic: Imports