Introduction

The new yearbook

The 2011 International Trade Statistics Yearbook (2011 ITSY) is being issued in two volumes which are prepared at different points in time during 2012.¹ Volume I is compiled early in 2012 to allow for an advanced release of an overview of international merchandise trade in 2011 and for a much earlier publication of the available 2011 country (area) data. Volume II contains the detailed tables showing international trade in main commodity groups and is finalized approximately six months after the completion of Volume I as the preparation of those tables requires additional country data which, normally, become available later in the year. Volume II contains also updated versions of the two world trade tables published in Volume I.

Detailed data for a total of 174 countries (or areas) are shown in Volume I with the 2011 data on imports and exports by commodity and trading partner provided for 92 countries (areas), representing approximately 79 percent of world trade of 2011. All tables of Volume I are made available electronically shortly after the completion of the manuscript. Beginning with the 2008 edition, Volume I is published in a redesigned format in respect to the presentation of data for individual countries with the aim to provide a more analytical and condensed view of a country’s trade performance (country trade profile).

The detailed information about the trade of particular countries by commodity and partner (values and quantities) contained in the tables and graphs for individual countries in Volume I and commodities in Volume II are taken from the publicly available database UN Comtrade (http://comtrade.un.org/db/default.aspx). Users are advised to visit UN Comtrade for any additional and more current information as it is continuously updated.

Concepts and definitions of International Merchandise Trade Statistics

The statistics in this Yearbook have been compiled by national statistical authorities largely consistent with the United Nations recommended International Merchandise Trade Statistics, Concepts and Definitions 2010 (IMTS 2010).² The main elements of the concepts and definitions are:

1. Coverage: As a general guideline, it is recommended that international merchandise trade statistics record all goods which add to or subtract from the stock of material resources of a country by entering (imports) or leaving (exports) its economic territory. The general guideline is subject to the clarifications provided in IMTS 2010, in particular, to the specific guidelines in chapter 1 concerning the inclusion or exclusion of certain categories of goods.


2. Time of recording: As a general guideline, it is recommended that goods be recorded at the time when they enter or leave the economic territory of a country.


3. Statistical territory: The statistical territory of a country is the territory with respect to which trade data are being compiled. The definition of the statistical territory may or may not coincide with the economic territory of a country or its customs territory, depending on the availability of data sources and other considerations.  It follows that when the statistical territory of a country and its economic territory differ, international merchandise trade statistics do not provide a complete record of inward and outward flows of goods.


4. The trade systems: Depending on what parts of the economic territory are included in the statistical territory, the trade data-compilation system adopted by a country (its trade system) may be referred to as general or special.

   (a) The general trade systemis in use when the statistical territory coincides with the economic territory. Consequently, it is recommended that the statistical territory of a country applying the general trade system comprises all applicable territorial elements. In this case, imports include goods entering the free circulation area, premises for inward processing, industrial free zones, premises for customs warehousing or commercial free zones and exports include goods leaving those territorial elements;

   (b) The special trade systemis in use when the statistical territory comprises only a particular part of the economic territory, so that certain flows of goods which are in the scope of IMTS 2010 are not included in either import or export statistics of the compiling country. The strict definition of the special trade system is in use when the statistical territory comprises only the free circulation area, that is, the part within which goods “may be disposed of without customs restriction”. Consequently, in such a case, imports include only goods entering the free circulation area of a compiling country and exports include only goods leaving the free circulation area of a compiling country.

   (c) The relaxed definition of the special trade system is in use when (a) goods that enter a country for, or leave it after, inward processing, as well as (b) goods that enter or leave an industrial free zone, are also recorded and included in international merchandise trade statistics

5. Classification: It is recommended that countries use the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS) for the collection, compilation and dissemination of international merchandise trade statistics as suggested by the Statistical Commission at its twenty-seventh session (22 February to 3 March 1993).³ The Harmonized System was adopted by the Customs Co-operation Council in June 1983, and the International Convention on the Harmonized System (HS Convention) entered into force on 1 January 1988 (HS 1988).⁴ In accordance with the preamble to the HS Convention, which recognized the importance of ensuring that the HS be kept up to date in the light of changes in technology or in patterns of international trade, the HS is regularly reviewed and revised. The fourth edition, HS 2007 which is a substantial revision from previous versions came into effect 1 January 2007.⁵ The Standard International Trade Classification (SITC)⁶ which was in the past used by countries in data compilation and reporting has been recognized for its continued use in analysis.⁷


6. Valuation: At its fifteenth session, in 1953, the Economic and Social Council, taking the view that trade statistics must reflect economic realities, recommended that the Governments of Member States of the United Nations, wherever possible, use transaction values in the compilation of their national statistics of external trade or, when national practices are based on other values, endeavor to provide supplementary statistical data based on transaction values (Economic and Social Council resolution 469 B (XV)). To promote the comparability of international merchandise trade statistics and taking into account the commercial and data reporting practices of the majority of countries, it is recommended that: (a) The statistical value of imported goods be a CIF-type value; (b) The statistical value of exported goods be an FOB-type value; however, countries are encouraged to compile FOB-type value of imported good as supplementary information. FOB-type values include the transaction value of the goods and the value of services performed to deliver goods to the border of the exporting country. CIF-type values include the transaction value of the goods, the value of services performed to deliver goods to the border of the exporting country and the value of the services performed to deliver the goods from the border of the exporting country to the border of the importing country.


7. Partner country: It is recommended that in the case of imports, the country of origin be recorded; and that in the case of exports, the country of last known destination be recorded. The country of origin of a good (for imports) is determined by rules of origin established by each country. The country of last known destination is the last country - as far as it is known at the time of exportation - to which goods are to be delivered, irrespective of where they have been initially dispatched to and whether or not, on their way to that last country, they are subject to any commercial transactions or other operations which change their legal status. Further, it is recommended that country of consignment be recorded for imports as the second partner country attribution, alongside country of origin; the compilation of export statistics on the country of consignment basis is only encouraged, depending on a country’s needs and circumstances.

The pages containing the country profiles (part 2 of this publication) indicate the trade system, valuation and partner attribution each country is following. For more detailed information on national practices in the compilation and dissemination of international merchandise trade data please go to http://unstats.un.org/unsd/tradereport/introduction_MM.asp.

Sources and Presentation

Sources: Figures on the total imports and exports of countries (or areas) presented in world table A are mainly taken from International Financial Statistics (IFS) published monthly by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) but also from other sources such as national publications and websites and the United Nations Monthly Bulletin of Statistics Questionnaire for the following countries: Andorra, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Cuba, Gibraltar, Montenegro (beginning 2006), Niue, Occupied Palestinian Territory, Russian Federation (beginning 1994), Serbia and Montenegro (before 2006), Turkmenistan, Turks and Caicos, Tuvalu and Uzbekistan. Estimates for missing data are made in order to arrive to regional totals but are otherwise not shown. The estimation process is automated using quarterly year-on-year growth rates for the extrapolation of missing quarterly data (unless quarterly data can be estimated using available monthly data within the quarter). Regional totals containing estimated data are printed in bold. Estimates are reviewed and adjusted where necessary. Table A shows data as available by end of May 2012.

Figures presented in world table D are calculated using UN Comtrade data (see details below). Data for missing reporters 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. All estimates are reviewed and adjusted where necessary. Table D uses data as available on UN Comtrade by end of May 2012.

The figures in the country tables and graphs of part 2 (country trade profiles) are obtained from data directly submitted by countries to the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) or received via international and regional partner organizations such as the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the International Trade Centre (ITC), the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat, the Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the UN regional commissions such as the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). Data for the European Union (EU-27) is received from the Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat). All data published in the country profiles is available on UN Comtrade (http://comtrade.un.org/). Modifications to the received data are only made in the case the provided data is obviously incomplete (in particular in the case of unreported oil exports). Quantity information that is missing or does not comply with the World Customs Organization’s recommendations for the quantity unit is estimated (and flagged on UN Comtrade accordingly). For data processed before June 2009 some quantity information that were identified as ‘extreme’ – meaning far outside a pre-defined ‘normal’ range were replaced on UN Comtrade with estimates. In this publication some quantity information (in table 3 and 5) is not shown as deemed appropriate. The estimation of quantities is either based on the country’s own data or uses so called standard unit values which are derived from the available information for all countries of the previous year. The country tables and graphs contain data as available on UN Comtrade by end of May 2012.

The totals of imports and exports presented in table A on the one hand and table D and the country profiles on the other hand are not necessarily identical as IFS and UN Comtrade are based on different data collection systems with different aims, procedures, timetable and sources for update and maintenance. Nevertheless, discrepancies are in general minor and usually do not affect the overall information provided in these tables. A systematic comparison of the figures from both sources (which includes the description of known and relevant conceptual differences) is available at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/imts/annual%20totals.htm. Overall, the discrepancy in the world total or world aggregate of exports in table A and table D is around 0.5 percent or less for all years shown, which is minor, given the differences between the two sources.

Currency conversion: For data in this publication, conversion of values from national currencies into United States dollars is done by means of currency conversion factors based on official exchange rates. Values in currencies subject to fluctuation are converted into United States dollars using weighted average exchange rates specially calculated for this purpose. The weighted average exchange rate for a given currency for a given year is the component monthly factors, furnished by the International Monetary Fund in its IFS publication, weighted by the value of the relevant trade in each month; a monthly factor is the exchange rate (or the simple average rate) in effect during that month. These factors are applied to total imports and exports and to the trade in individual commodities with individual countries. The conversion factors applied to the data presented in table A are published quarterly in the UN Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (http://unstats.un.org/unsd/mbs/default.aspx) and are also available at: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/imts/analyticaltradetables.htm. For data published on UN Comtrade the applied conversion factors are available in a country’s metadata on UN Comtrade.

Classification: Essentially all countries follow the recommendation to report their detailed merchandise trade data according to the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS) (see paragraph 5). In order to provide comparable time series data on UN Comtrade for all countries, the data reported in the latest HS classification is converted into earlier versions of the HS and to corresponding or earlier versions of the Standard International Trade Classification (SITC).⁸. Beginning 2007 many countries (or areas) started to compile their trade data according to the 2007 edition of the HS classification⁹ and following the past practices the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) developed and implemented the required conversion tables. - The commodities in this publication are mostly presented according to the one-digit sections of SITC, Rev.3¹⁰ as the SITC sections provide a limited set of economically meaningful main categories. In addition, data according to SITC, Rev.3 is available for long time series. In two tables commodities are presented in terms of four-digit headings of the HS, often according to the 2007 version of HS but in many cases also in earlier HS versions.¹¹. The HS headings provide a meaningful description of traded commodities at the detailed (but not too detailed) level and also allow the presentation of quantity information.

Period: Generally, data refer to calendar years; however, for those countries which report according to some other reference year, the data are presented in the year which covers the majority of the reference year used by the country. Concerning the data on UN Comtrade the only country for which data is not available by calendar year is Nepal for which the data refers to the fiscal year from mid of July of the previous to mid of July of the current year.

Country nomenclature: The naming of countries (or areas) in this publication follows in general the United Nations Standard Country or Area Codes for Statistical Use¹². The names and composition of countries as reporter are changing over time. Also, countries rarely follow the identical nomenclature in the recording of partner information. For example where former geographical entities commonly referred to in national statistics have changed, countries may introduce the corresponding changes in their statistics at different times. In this publication wherever possible parts of the world have been designated by the names they currently bear and the trading partner attribution has been standardized. The following information is relevant for the data presented in this publication:

1.   In this publication the data published under the heading China exclude those for Taiwan Province. Figures representing the trade with Taiwan Province, which may have been reported by any reporting country or area, are included in the grouping Asia.  For statistical purposes, the data for China do not include those for Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and Macao Special Administrative Region.

2.   Beginning 1 January 1997, the overseas departments of France were included in the statistical territory of France for the purposes of international trade statistics.  Values on this basis have been provided by France for 1996 also, and values are published on that basis in this publication.

3.   Beginning 1 January 1999, Belgium and Luxembourg provide their international trade statistics separately.

4.   Beginning 1 January 2000, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa and Swaziland provide their international trade statistics separately. For periods prior to 1 January 2000, unless otherwise indicated, data are shown for the Southern African Customs Union.

5.   On 4 February 2003, the official name of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has been changed to Serbia and Montenegro. Data provided for Yugoslavia prior to 1 January 1992 refer to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia which was composed of six republics. Data referring to the years 1992 and later are attributed to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovenia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

6.   On 3 June 2006, Serbia and Montenegro formally dissolved into two independent countries: Montenegro and Serbia.

7.   On 10 October 2010 the federation of the Netherlands Antilles was formally dissolved. The former Dutch Caribbean dependency ceased to exist with a change of the five islands' constitutional status. Under the new political structure, Curaçao and Sint Maarten (Dutch part) have become autonomous countries within the Kingdom of the Netherlands, joining Aruba, which gained the status in 1986. The islands of the remaining territorial grouping, alternately known as Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba or the BES islands, are special municipalities and part of the country of the Netherlands and overseas territories of the European Union. For statistical purposes, the data for the Netherlands do not include the BES islands.

Regional groupings: This publication uses the regional groupings of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Indicator Database which are shown below (for their composition see table A and http://unstats.un.org/unsd/mdg/default.aspx). The category ‘Other’ applies only to the presentation of data by trading partner and consists of Antarctica, Bunkers, Free Zones, ‘Special Categories’ (confidential partner) and Areas nes.:

Aggregations: All regional aggregations are calculated as the sum of their components. This also includes the regional and world totals presented in table A (in bold) which up to the 2007 edition of this yearbook and in the tables currently published in the United Nations Monthly Bulletin of Statistics are calculated by subtracting re-exports from the imports and exports.

Additional country groupings: The composition of the additional country groupings which are used in world table A is as follows:

ANCOM‑Andean Common Market
Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Colombia, Ecuador and Peru

APEC‑Asian‑Pacific Economic Co‑operation
Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, Singapore, Taiwan Province of China, Thailand, United States of America and Viet Nam

ASEAN‑Association of South‑East Asian Nations
Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Viet Nam

CACM‑Central American Common Market
Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua

CARICOM‑Caribbean Community and Common Market
Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas (member of the Community only), Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago

COMESA‑Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa
Burundi, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sudan, Swaziland, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe

ECOWAS ‑ Economic Community of West African States
Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d'Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea‑Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo

EFTA - European Free Trade Association
Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland

EMCCA – Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa
Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon

EU-27 ‑ European Union 27
Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden and United Kingdom

EU-25 ‑ European Union 25
Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and United Kingdom (EU15) plus Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Cyprus

LAIA ‑ Latin American Integration Association (formerly Latin American Free Trade Association)
Argentina, Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of)

LDC ‑ Least developed countries
Afghanistan, Angola, Bangladesh, Benin, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea‑Bissau, Haiti, Kiribati, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Niger, Rwanda, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Somalia, Sudan, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tuvalu, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Vanuatu, Yemen and Zambia

MERCOSUR‑Mercado Comun Sud-Americano
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay

NAFTA‑Northern American Free Trade Area
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay

OECD‑Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom and United States of America

OPEC‑Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
Algeria, Angola, Ecuador, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of)

Description of world trade tables of part 1 (Tables A and D)

Total imports and exports for countries and regions in U.S. dollars (Table A): The total value of world trade reached U.S. dollars 17.9 trillion in 2011, measured in terms of exports valued FOB at the border of the exporting country. This is an increase of 19 percent compared with the previous year during which trade rose by 22 percent. Table A provides a breakdown of this figure by country (or area) and also shows imports and the trade balance. For example, the biggest exporter in 2011 with exports of U.S. dollar 1,899 billion was China, followed by the United States with U.S. dollar 1,480 billion and Germany with U.S. dollar 1,475 billion. The United States was the biggest importer with imports of U.S. dollar 2,265 billion in 2011 which resulted in a trade deficit of U.S. dollar 785 billion, while Germany and China recorded trade surpluses of U.S. dollar 220 billion and 157 billion respectively.

World exports by provenance and destination in U.S. dollars (Table D): This table provides a breakdown of the world exports by regions and countries according to their provenance and destination, for the total of trade but also detailed by individual SITC sections or groupings of sections (the same list as for Table 1 and 2 applies – see para. 22 below). For example, the table shows that in 2011 developed economies of Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America were the destination of 54% of world exports (U.S. dollar 9.7 trillion) and the origin of 52% of world exports (9.3 trillion).¹³.

For the general note and footnotes, see the end of the tables. A slightly different version of Table A containing quarterly and monthly data is published on a monthly basis as table 34 in the United Nations Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (MBS)¹⁴ . Updated, although different versions of Table D, are published as table 40, 41 and 42 in the July, September and November editions of the MBS.

Description of country tables and graphs of part 2

Part 2 contains detailed data (the country profile) for individual countries or areas. Given the economic importance of the European Union (EU), separate pages have been added for the external trade of the EU (with its 27 members) as a whole. These pages are given as a memorandum item after the country pages.

Not all countries have data up to 2011 and not all countries have data for imports and exports for all years. The publication of a country (or area) in part 2 requires that data for at least up to the year 2007 is available. Depending on the availability of data the following tables and graphs usually appear for each country or area:

Exports and Imports by SITC sections (Table 1 and Table 2): These tables show the structure of exports and imports in 2011 (or the latest available year) by SITC sections in terms of value, share of the total, growth in respect to the previous year and annual average growth for the last four years which is calculated as the geometric mean. The description of the SITC sections used in the tables is provided below:¹⁵

Top 10 export and import commodities (Table 3 and Table 5): These tables present the top 10 commodities in terms of 4-digit HS headings for exports and imports, respectively, using the aggregate of trade values for the last three reporting years as available. For countries which reported the last three years of data in HS 2007 the data in these tables is following HS 2007. For most other countries the data in these tables is presented in HS 2002 with data for some years converted from HS 2007 into HS 2002 as required (see paragraph 11). For a few countries the table contains data according to the HS 1996 or even HS 1992. For the convenience of users the last column shows the SITC group (3 digits) that corresponds to the HS heading. The SITC group is identified based on the correlation and conversion tables between HS and SITC, Rev 3. The conversion tables are available on the website of UNSD at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/methodology%20imts.htm.

For those commodities and those years, the tables contain trade values and unit values. Unit values are expressed in U.S. dollars (US$) per indicator of unit (kg, unit, Megawatt-hours (Mwh), pair, litre, carat etc.). The calculation of unit values on the heading level requires the availability of value and quantity information for all of the underlying detailed data (6-digit subheadings). In some cases the quantity information for some sub-headings was estimated (see paragraph 8) and the unit value for the heading appears in italics.

Exports by principal countries and SITC sections (Table 4): This table presents the top 10 partners for exports of the latest available year. For each country in the top 10, the table reports the value of exports to that country and the structure of those exports according to SITC sections. For the definition of SITC sections used in this table, see paragraph 22 above.

Total imports, exports and trade balance (Graph 1): This graph presents the evolution of imports, exports and trade balance over the last fifteen years.

Trade balance by MDG Regions (Graph 2): This graph presents for the most recent year for which information on exports and imports is available the trade balance by regions according to the regions used in the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Indicator Database (see paragraph 14 above).

Partner concentration of trade (Graph 3): This graph shows the partner concentration of imports and exports for the latest available year for the top 25 partners which usually account for a very large share of exports or imports in most countries. On the horizontal axis from the center to the right are the cumulative percent of exports and from the center to the left the cumulative percent of imports. On the vertical axis is the cumulative number of partners ranked by total value of exports and imports in a decreasing order.

Graph 3 shows as additional information the Herfindahl-Hirschman (HH) Index for imports and exports, which is a measure of concentration. In the case of exports (imports), the HH index is the sum of squares of the percentages of the partner’s share of total exports (imports):

N is the number of trading partners for exports (imports) and Xi is the value of exports (imports) to partner country i and X is the total value of exports (imports). The lower the HH index, the lower the partner concentration, and vice versa. If there is only one trading partner the HH index would equal 1.¹⁶

¹ The 2011 ITSY is the sixtieth edition of this yearbook.
² At its forty-first session, held from 23 to 26 February 2010, the Statistical Commission adopted the revised recommendations “International merchandise trade statistics: concepts and definitions 2010”(IMTS 2010) which provide very important amendments while retaining the existing conceptual framework contained in the previous recommendations. The publication is available under Statistical Papers, Series M No. 52, Rev.3 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.10.XVII.13) and electronically at: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/pubs/gesgrid.asp?id=449.
³  See Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 1993, Supplement No. 6 (E/1993/26), para. 162 (d).
⁴ See Customs Co-operation Council, The Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, Brussels, 1989.
⁵ See World Customs Organization, Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, Fourth Edition (2007), Brussels 2005.
⁶ Standard International Trade Classification, Original, Statistical Papers, Series M No.10, Second Edition, 1951 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.51.XVII.1); subsequent editions are published as United Nations publications under Series M No.34.
⁷ See Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 1999, Supplement No. 4 (E/1993/24), para. 24 (c).
⁸  Detailed information on the data conversions used for UN Comtrade can be found on the website of the United Nations Statistics Division at: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/conversions/HS%20Correlation%20and%20Conversion%20tables.htm.
⁹  See World Customs Organization, Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, Fourth Edition (2007), Brussels 2005.
¹⁰  Standard International Trade Classification, Revision 3, Statistical Papers, Series M No.34/Rev.3, (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.86.XVII.12). SITC, Revision 4 was accepted by the United Nations Statistical Commission at its thirty-seventh session in March 2006 (see Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 2006, Supplement No. 4, (E/CN.3/2006/32), chapter III, para. 26 (b)). Yet it will require several years until a time series of data according to SITC, Revision 4 will be sufficiently long for publication.
¹¹  World Customs Organization, Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, Third Edition (2002) (HS 2002); World Customs Organization, Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, Second Edition (1996) (HS 1996); World Customs Organization, Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (1992) (HS 1992).
¹²  Standard Country or Area Codes for Statistical Use, Series M No. 49, Rev.4, (United Nations publication, Sales No. M.98.XVII.9). The latest information is available online at: http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49.htm..
¹³  These percentages or shares of world trade are measured based on the trade between countries (or areas) which includes the trade of the countries within one region.
¹⁴  The difference between table A in this publication and table 34 in the MBS relates to the calculation of regional aggregations (see paragraph 15).
¹⁵  For the purpose of presentation, the section 0 (“Food and live animals”) and section 1 (“Beverages and tobacco”) have been aggregated into 0+1 named “Food, beverages and tobacco” and section 2 (“Crude materials, inedible, except fuels”) and section 4 (“Animal and vegetable soils, fats and waxes”) have been aggregated into 2+4 named “Crude materials (excluding fuels), oils, fats”.
¹⁶ Users might wish to define a specific limit of the HH index to indicate low concentration and a limit to indicate high concentration. Yet, for its application in the measurement of partner concentration in international merchandise trade statistics no such boundaries are known to be established.

Abbreviations and Explanation of symbols

Names of some countries (or areas) or groups of countries (or areas) and of some commodities or groups of commodities have been abbreviated.  Exact titles of countries or commodities can be found in various editions of the following publications referred to in the introduction (see paragraphs 11 and 13):

(i)            Standard Country or Area Codes for Statistical Use
(ii)           Standard International Trade Classification (SITC)
(iii)          Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS)

In addition, the following abbreviations and symbols are used in this publication:

Disclaimer

The tables, graphs and text contained in part 2 of this publication are provided only for illustration and despite all efforts might contain errors. When using this data users are advised to verify the latest information on UN Comtrade which is the source of this data.

UN Comtrade Subscription information

Contact

This yearbook has been produced by the International Merchandise Trade Statistics Section of the United Nations Statistics Division/ Department of Economic and Social Affairs. For questions or comments please contact us at:

International Merchandise Trade Statistics Section
United Nations Statistics Division
2 United Nations Plaza, DC2-1540
New York, New York 10017
e-mail: comtrade@un.org

http://comtrade.un.org/ or
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/imts/imts_default.htm