.gif){kind=small}
BACK TO HOME
PAGE BACK TO HOME
PAGE EUROPEAN REVIEW
What is the share of the European Union in world trade? How has the EU's trade in services developed in the last few years? Is trade in services growing faster than trade in goods? What are the EU's strong points and weak points, when it comes to competition? What are the countries that attract European investment abroad? What is the position of the United States and -Japan, and also the countries of Central Europe and China, in EU trade?
Eurostat has attempted to answer these questions during the continuing 'Millennium Round' in World trade negotiations. Their recent memo sets out to review the major trends in the EU's external trade by summarising the range of information that is available. It is divided into three parts: trade in goods, trade in services and foreign direct investment. The European Review has space in this issue for only one table and two pie charts from the first part. On the right are the details of the exports and imports of the major world trading nations and groups of nations in 1998, also shown is the balance of trade, that is exports minus imports. This shows the EU to be the largest exporter and second to the United States for imports. However while the Union has a healthy surplus on its balance of trade, the U.S.A. is heavily in the red. Below, the two charts show EU exports and imports to be spread fairly equally all over the world.
Country
|
Exports |
%world |
Imports |
%world |
balance of trade |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
EU 15 |
731.6 |
19.7 |
712.4 |
18.4 |
19.2 |
|
USA |
606.9 |
16.3 |
842.6 |
21.7 |
-235.7 |
|
Japan |
346.1 |
9.3 |
250.9 |
6.5 |
95.2 |
|
Canada |
188.5 |
5.1 |
177.7 |
4.6 |
10.8 |
|
China |
163.9 |
4.4 |
125.2 |
3.2 |
38.7 |
|
Hong Kong |
154.9 |
4.2 |
164.7 |
4.2 |
-9.7 |
|
Rest of the World |
1520.1 |
41.0 |
1607.4 |
41.4 |
-87.3 |
|
|
|
EU imports by region 1998 |
EU exports by region 1998 |
Recently released figures from Eurostat show that EU expenditure on R & D grew by14% in real terms between 1988 and 1997. The comparisons for the U.S. and Japan are 21% and 35% respectively. Inside the EU, the Nordic countries lead the way as can be seen from the table below which shows both the total and sectoral R & D investment as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product in 1997 except where stated.
Country |
Business |
Government |
Higher Education |
TOTAL |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Sweden |
2.86 |
0.14 |
0.82 |
3.8 |
|
Finland |
1.83 |
0.38 |
0.55 |
2.8 |
|
Germany (1996) |
1.52 |
0.35 |
0.42 |
2.3 |
|
France (1996) |
1.44 |
0.47 |
0.39 |
2.3 |
|
Denmark |
1.28 |
0.35 |
0.42 |
2.1 |
|
UK |
1.22 |
0.26 |
0.37 |
1.9 |
|
Netherlands (1996) |
1.11 |
0.39 |
0.6 |
2.1 |
|
Belgium (1995) |
1.08 |
0.06 |
0.44 |
1.6 |
|
Ireland (1995) |
0.94 |
0.13 |
0.26 |
1.3 |
|
Austria (1993) |
0.83 |
0.13 |
0.52 |
1.5 |
|
Italy |
0.58 |
0.22 |
0.28 |
1.1 |
|
Spain |
0.42 |
0.15 |
0.28 |
0.9 |
|
Portugal |
0.15 |
0.16 |
0.27 |
0.7 |
|
Greece (1993) |
0.13 |
0.15 |
0.19 |
0.5 |
|
Back to |
Forward to |
Up to |
