OECD members - 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 OECD members was 31.78 as of 2020. Its highest value over the past 60 years was 31.78 in 2020, while its lowest value was 12.27 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 17.96
1961 17.25
1962 17.15
1963 17.11
1964 17.33
1965 16.70
1966 16.78
1967 16.25
1968 15.68
1969 15.19
1970 14.47
1971 13.78
1972 13.54
1973 14.26
1974 17.55
1975 16.74
1976 17.20
1977 17.91
1978 16.62
1979 17.23
1980 17.65
1981 16.07
1982 16.49
1983 16.63
1984 16.41
1985 15.90
1986 12.68
1987 12.49
1988 12.27
1989 13.02
1990 13.15
1991 13.45
1992 14.22
1993 16.55
1994 17.22
1995 17.37
1996 18.16
1997 18.58
1998 18.19
1999 18.86
2000 20.89
2001 21.37
2002 22.01
2003 22.78
2004 23.84
2005 25.54
2006 26.71
2007 27.06
2008 28.19
2009 28.29
2010 30.40
2011 30.48
2012 30.93
2013 30.51
2014 30.52
2015 31.14
2016 30.86
2017 31.25
2018 31.35
2019 31.14
2020 31.78

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