I’m in the process of updating a Global Market Analysis of export markets for US-made whiskey that we published a few years ago in the B.C. era (before Covid). As part of the overhaul, I’m revisiting the data sources used to identify high-potential markets and incorporating some new ones. One of these is the United Nations Comtrade Database.
Quoting Comtrade’s About page, “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.”
The database features comprehensive import and export statistics by year, country/territory, and six-digit Harmonized System commodity code. The data can be filtered to display global or bilateral import or export figures for each market. Besides dollar value, the statistics also include unit quantities, making it easy to calculate average prices for each market and period. The website provides analytics and visualization tools, and CSV extracts can be downloaded after registering for a free account.
Needless to say, a degree of caution is in order when using these statistics. For one thing, data for certain periods and/or countries is often missing, especially for smaller and less-developed markets. More importantly, trade volume trends during the pandemic and immediate post-pandemic years reflect the unusually volatile conditions during this period. As you may have heard, “past performance is no guarantee of future results.”
Still, data to be taken with a grain of salt is better than none at all. Some very preliminary number crunching reveals that the greatest average annual growth in whiskey imports between 2019 and 2023 took place in China, with an average increase of over $94 million per year. Does this mean that American craft distillers should be rushing to get in on the action in China? Well, not necessarily, at least not without a lot more research and preparation….