Trade in goods

Since its creation, the OECD has sought to promote international trade, considering it an effective way of enhancing economic growth and raising living standards. Member countries benefit from increased trade as do OECD’s trade partners in the rest of the world.

Definition

According to United Nations guidelines, 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. Goods simply being transported through a country or goods temporarily admitted or withdrawn (except for goods for inward or outward processing) are not included in the international merchandise trade statistics.

Comparability

All OECD countries use the United Nations guidelines so far as their data sources allow. There are some, generally minor, differences across countries in the coverage of certain types of transactions such as postal trade, imports and exports of military equipment under defence agreements, sea products traded by domestic vessels on the high seas and goods entering or leaving bonded customs areas.

Exports are usually valued free on board (f.o.b.), with the exception of the United States which values exports free alongside ship (f.a.s.), which is lower than f.o.b. by the cost of loading the goods on board. Imports are valued by most countries at cost, insurance and freight (c.i.f.) i.e. the cost of the goods plus the costs of insurance and freight to bring the goods to the borders of the importing country. The following countries, however, report their imports at f.o.b. values: Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Mexico and the Slovak Republic. The trade balances shown in the table are, therefore, not strictly comparable because imports are not valued in the same way by all countries.

The introduction by the European Union of the single market in 1993 resulted in some loss of accuracy for intra-EU trade because customs documents were no longer available to record all imports and exports. Note that while the OECD data mostly follow the UN recommendations, trade statistics reported by Eurostat follow the Community definitions. As a result, OECD trade statistics for European Union countries are not strictly comparable with those reported by Eurostat.

OECD total includes Hungary and Poland from 1992, the Czech Republic from 1993, Korea from 1994 and the Slovak Republic from 1997.