About the Data

The United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database (UN Comtrade) contains detailed goods imports and exports statistics reported by statistical authorities of close to 200 countries or areas. It concerns annual trade data from 1962 to the most recent year. UN Comtrade is considered the most comprehensive trade database available with more than 3 billion records. UN Comtrade data covers trade in goods only and are compiled on a customs basis. This means they are not compatible with data collected on a balance of payments basis. All data are reported in current US dollar values, calculated using an average annual exchange rate. This is calculated by weighting the monthly exchange rate with the monthly volume of trade. Commodity data are available through the interactive tool, based on the Standard International Trade Classification (SITC), Rev.3 at the 2 and 3 digit levels (http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cr/registry/regcst.asp?Cl=14). The original data is normally reported in the latest revision of Harmonized System (HS), and is then converted by UNSD to SITC Rev.3 using appropriate correlation tables (available at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/conversions/HS%20Correlation%20and%20Conversion%20tables.htm). Please note that if the scope of a heading in one classification is split between scopes of several headings in the other classification only an approximate correlation is possible. As documented in UN Comtrade guidance the value of 're-exports' and 're-imports' are included in the value of 'exports' and 'imports' respectively. For further information on re-exports and re-imports please see here. Data in this visualization consists of data as reported by UN Comtrade (at three-digit level of SITC Rev. 3 and detailed trading partners breakdown) and estimated data for missing reporters. The data are estimated either through the extrapolation of the data of the two adjacent years, or, if this is not possible, through the use of the data reported by the trading partners (so called mirror data). Mirror statistics is also used in case the partner distribution or confidential data make it necessary to adjust the reported data. In addition, modifications to the received data are made in cases where the provided data are obviously incomplete, in particular in the case of unreported petroleum oils exports in merchandise data. The data are regularly refreshed and missing data gaps are estimated every 2nd week taking into account incoming new/revised datasets. This means that the data available through the visualization will always reflect the very latest data available on the UN Comtrade website with maximum lag time of one month. The information on the latest data update is made available within the visualization. The compositions of the regional groupings are based on those used in the UN International Trade Statistics Yearbook, available here: http://comtrade.un.org/pb/groupings.aspx.

Limitations

Data on trade in services are not currently included in this visualization. Data on international trade in services are available on our beta trade data extraction interface at http://comtrade.un.org/data/. The partner "Areas NES (not elsewhere specified)" is used (a) for low value trade and (b) if the partner designation was unknown to the country or if an error was made in the partner assignment. The reporting country does not send the UN details of the trading partner in these specific cases. Sometimes reporters do this to protect company information. It is not possible to display “Areas, NES” and other non-geographically specific areas on the map. When data are available for these partners it will be displayed in the relevant charts. The values of the reported detailed commodity data do not necessarily sum up to the total trade value for a given country dataset. Due to confidentiality, countries may not report some of its detailed trade. This trade will - however - be included at the higher commodity level and in the total trade value. Countries (or areas) do not necessarily report their trade statistics for each and every year. To the extent possible, data gaps are estimated (see About Data section for estimation methodology). Imports reported by one country do not coincide with exports reported by its trading partner. Differences are due to various factors including valuation (imports CIF, exports FOB), differences in inclusions/ exclusions of particular commodities, timing etc. Almost all countries report as partner country for imports the country of origin, which is determined by the rules of origin established by each country.

Copyright

Data from the UN Comtrade database are copyrighted by the United Nations. For publication of UN Comtrade data in a few tables or graphs in newspaper articles, journals, other magazines or books, it is not necessary to request permission; please refer to the source of the data as “DESA/UNSD, United Nations Comtrade database”. The full Policy on Use and Re-use of UN Comtrade information is available here.