In 2022 the European Union ran a goods trade deficit of nearly 430 billion euros, after years of surplus, mainly because fuel imports became far more expensive after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Germany is the EU’s largest exporter and its largest market, about 62% of member states’ exports go to other EU countries, and China overtook the United States as the largest source of the EU’s external imports in 2005. The figures and charts below come from Statista’s EU international trade dossier and cover 2002 to 2022; they were current when this post was written in October 2023.
The EU manages trade through its Single Market for member states and a common commercial policy towards the rest of the world. It protects some industries but depends on goods and technology from outside the bloc, including from the US and China, despite trade disputes and security concerns. Keeping trade with China open while dealing with those security concerns is one of the EU’s main trade questions of the 2020s. For how tariffs and other measures shape these flows, see tariffs and trade barriers in global trade.
Who do EU countries trade with the most?
Germany is both the largest exporter and the top export market within the EU. In recent years the country’s trade surplus, often criticised by other EU members, has rebalanced. Germany’s share of total EU imports dropped from 15% to under 12% in 2022, while its share of all exports from EU countries rose from under 13% to nearly 14%. The United States and the larger EU economies, such as France, Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands, are also major export destinations. The UK’s share of EU exports has halved since 2002.
Annual goods trade balance of the European Union, 2002 to 2022
The EU moved from a trade surplus to a deficit of nearly 430 billion euros in 2022. Eurostat recorded it as the highest EU trade deficit on record. The cause was a sharp rise in the cost of fuel imports after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the EU’s boycott of Russian energy.
Balance of trade in services in the European Union in 2021, by member state
In 2021, according to the Statista chart, Spain, France and Poland had the largest services trade surpluses in the EU. Italy and Finland were the only countries with deficits: Italy’s was nearly 12 billion euros, well above Finland’s 2.3 billion euros.
Share of intra- and extra-EU exports in total, 2002 to 2022
The share of member states’ exports going to other EU countries fell during the financial crises but recovered to around 62% in the early 2020s. The UK’s exit in 2020 did not change the share much, which suggests the UK had already become a less important partner for EU exporters.
Share of intra- and extra-EU imports in total, 2002 to 2022
The intra-EU share of member states’ imports fell from 62% in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, to 57.72% in 2022. Imports from outside the EU reached a 20-year high. Two reasons are China’s rise as an exporter and the UK’s exit from the EU in 2020, which turned imports from the UK from intra-EU into extra-EU trade.
EU share of world exports and imports, 2002 to 2021
Over the past two decades the EU’s share of world exports and imports has fallen. The EU ran a small trade deficit during the Great Recession and the eurozone crisis, then a large surplus after 2011. Countries such as Germany, which specialise in exporting chemicals, manufactured goods and heavy machinery, drove that surplus, helped by limited real wage growth for EU workers. The EU also imported heavy manufactured goods and was a large importer of energy and fuel. Longer-term product trends behind these shares are covered in the analysis of global trade trends by HS code, 2015 to 2023.
External trade balance of the EU by product, 2002 to 2021
To pay for its energy deficit, the EU has to export more manufactured goods than it imports. Over two decades it built up larger surpluses in machinery, transport equipment and chemicals, while its fuel deficit peaked in the early 2010s and then declined. The energy crisis that followed the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine makes the future surplus uncertain. The EU aims to cut its dependence on fossil fuels and become a clean energy superpower, which could eventually turn it from an energy importer into an exporter.
Emerging trade partners
China’s and Poland’s shares of EU exports have more than doubled, but each still takes under 4%. China’s share of EU imports has tripled, making it the third-largest exporter to the EU. It overtook the US as the largest external exporter to the EU in 2005 and now supplies 8.7% of EU imports, against 5% for the US. Russia’s share of EU imports doubled between 2002 and 2012 because of the EU’s reliance on Russian raw materials and energy. EU sanctions after the annexation of Crimea and the 2022 invasion of Ukraine reversed that, and further falls are expected as the EU reduces its ties with Russia.
EU trade policy in the 21st century
The European Union is a member of the WTO in its own right. The original version of this post also listed the IMF and the World Bank; that was wrong, as membership of those two institutions is held by the EU’s member states, not by the EU itself (corrected October 2026). The EU has concluded trade agreements with partners around the world, including candidate countries and countries in East and South-East Asia. The EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement, signed in 2020, kept preferential trade in place after Brexit, but the UK’s share of EU trade has fallen. Negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) with the US stalled at the end of 2016 and did not resume under the Trump administration; in 2019 the EU declared the negotiating directives obsolete, amid concerns that its standards and investor-state dispute settlement provisions would weaken democratic control. Wider shifts in trade policy since then are discussed in emerging trends in global trade policy.
About these figures
All figures refer to the years stated (2002 to 2022) and were taken from Statista in October 2023. Statista and Eurostat have since published newer data, so check them before quoting any number here as current.
Source: Statista