Welsh international goods trade: July 2021 to June 2022

From January 2022, HMRC implemented a change in data collection methods affecting trade in goods data on imports from the EU into Great Britain. This creates a break in the time series, users should take care when making comparisons with quarters and years prior to 2022 (see notes).

Further explanation of the data collection changes can be found in the HMRC full commentary (UK Trade Info) explanatory notes.

Data for 2021 and 2022 are provisional estimates and will be revised routinely over the next 18 months to account for late returns.

Year ending June 2022

Exports

• The value of goods exports for Wales was £18.4 billion, up £4.9 billion (36.7%) compared to the year ending June 2021.
• Comparing to the year ending June 2019 (pre-pandemic), goods exports for Wales were up £0.7 billion (3.7%) indicating that goods exports have recovered beyond pre-pandemic levels.
• There was an increase in exports to EU countries of £2.5 billion (31.1%) and an increase in exports to non-EU countries of £2.4 billion (45.2%) compared with the previous year. Exports to the EU accounted for 57.6% of Welsh exports compared with 51.5% for the UK.
• Exports from Wales continue to be dominated by ‘Machinery and Transport Equipment’ which made up £6.9bn (37.5%) of exports. However, a substantial increase was seen in the exports of Mineral Fuels, up £2.6bn (211%) compared with the previous year. Mineral Fuels exports accounted for 20.9% of all exports from Wales.
• ‘Power Generating Machinery and Equipment’ was the largest value product within the ‘Machinery and transport Equipment category’ with £2.6bn (13.9%) of Welsh exports. This is an increase of £0.9bn (51.6%) compared with the previous year.
• Within the Mineral Fuels category, ‘Petroleum, Petroleum Products and Related Materials’ was the highest value product with £3.7bn (20.3%) of Welsh exports. This is an increase of £2.6bn (211.1%) compared with the previous year.

Imports

• The value of goods imports for Wales was £20.6 billion, up £6.2 billion (43.2%) compared to the year ending June 2021.
• Comparing to the year ending June 2019 (pre-pandemic), goods imports for Wales were up £1.8 billion (9.7%) indicating that goods imports have recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
• There was an increase in imports from EU countries of £0.8 billion (13.8%) and an increase in imports from non-EU countries of £5.4 billion (65.0%) compared with the previous year. Imports from the EU accounted for 33.9% of Welsh imports compared with 48.2% for the UK.
• ‘Mineral Fuels’ is now the largest import category with 33.2% of total imports. It has overtaken ‘Machinery and Transport Equipment’ which is now the second largest category with 29.9% of total imports.
• Within the ‘Mineral Fuels’ category, ‘Petroleum, Petroleum Products and Related Materials’ was the highest value product with £5.9bn (28.5%) of Welsh imports. This is an increase of £3.7 billion (168.7%) compared with the previous year.
• Power Generating Machinery and Equipment’ was the largest value product within the ‘Machinery and transport Equipment category’ with £2.3bn (11.4%) of Welsh exports. This is an increase of £0.8bn (53.2%) compared with the previous year.

Notes

Because of changes to the way in which the data is collected, some small value trade that was previously allocated to countries and regions may now be reported under the ‘Unallocated-unknown’ category. This has led to a likely reduction in the UK to EU export values, and total export values for Wales (and other regions) from January 2021 onwards. More detailed notes of these effects can be read in the HMRC full commentary (UK Trade Info) on these statistics.

Some of the data included in this report may get revised by HMRC as part of their routine revisions to the data set. The latest data will be available on the UK Trade Info website.

Further Information

The data above relates to international goods trade. The most recent experimental statistics (for 2020) produced by the Office for National statistics suggest that service exports made up approximately 28% of total exports in Wales in 2020, with services imports making up around 19% of total imports.

Key results are published quarterly.

If you would like to provide any feedback on any aspect of these statistics, please email stats.trade@gov.wales