Imports of Ukraine: Road Transportation Increase against the General Trade Deficit.

After a 2-year decrease in road transportation market between the EU and Ukraine, it has been steadily growing since the beginning of the current year. Within the first 3 months in 2016, the volume of goods imported by road from the European Union to Ukraine increased by 24.1%, up to 1,063 thousand tons, against the same period in the previous year.

Road transportation has grown from 23 EU countries while goods imported from Finland, Spain and Estonia have decreased.

The increase of imports is observed throughout the whole Eurostat classification of goods. Import of agricultural goods has mainly grown due to non-food products. As for ready-to-eat goods, import of meat has grown noticeably. Besides, import of metal-rolls, building materials, chemicals (including goods of medical purpose, perfumery and household chemistry) has increased. Import of vehicles and agricultural equipment has grown considerably.

The largest increase of road transportation from the EU to Ukraine in physical terms (more than twice) is observed from the Netherlands (+52.6 thousand tons). Besides, goods traffic has grown significantly from Poland (+43.8 thousand tons), Germany (+52.6 thousand tons) and Slovakia (+14.6 thousand tons). Italy, Lithuania, France, the Czech Republic, Belgium and Austria are among the countries with the highest figures of goods imported to Ukraine.

Statistics. Road transportation market between the EU and Ukraine in the first 3 months of 2015/2016

One of the major reasons for the growth of road transportation from the EU is a considerable decrease of goods turnover with Russia against severe political infighting as well as developing trade relations with the European Union under the agreement on EU & Ukraine association. All this has led to partial replacement of Russian products by European goods.

It’s worth noting that positive dynamics in road transportation market between Ukraine and countries of the European Union in the first 3 months of the year 2016 was accompanied by a significant trade deficit (almost 10 times) in Ukraine: in January-March in 2016 it made $0.961 billion against $0.09 billion in January-March in 2015. As a result, export-import coverage ratio fell from 0.99 in January-March in 2015 to 0.89 in the same period of the current year.

Prepared by Marketing Department of TELS group of companies according to the data of the Statistical Office of the European Union, State Statistics Service of Ukraine, Interfax-Ukraine News Agency.