According to a new Eurostat report, agricultural trade between the European Union and the rest of the world has doubled since 2002.

The value of agricultural trade (import plus export) between the European Union (EU) and the rest of the world in 2018 amounted to 275 billion euros, which is equivalent to 7.0% of all additional international trade in goods in the EU.

In 2018, the United States was the main recipient of EU agricultural exports, with a 16% share. It was followed by China with 8%, Switzerland with 6%, Japan and Russia (5% for both countries) and Norway (4%).

Meanwhile, the United States and Brazil were the main sources of EU imports (9% each). The main export destinations for EU livestock products were China (15%), the USA (10%) and Japan (8%).

Norway was the largest source of imports of animal products in the EU (24% of the total in 2018), 99% of livestock products imported from Norway fall under the fish division, which amounts to 6.4 billion euros.

Between 2002 and 2018, commodity circulation in value terms more than doubled, which is equivalent to an average annual growth of 5.0%, while exports are growing faster (5.8%) than imports (4.3%).