Catalonia registers record exports

Overseas Catalan sales account for more than 25% of Spanish total

Container cranes in the Port of Barcelona. Archive (by ACN)
Container cranes in the Port of Barcelona. Archive (by ACN) / ACN

ACN | Madrid

August 23, 2017 03:42 PM

Catalonia continues to beat export records. The first six months of the year saw the highest levels of overseas sales since records began in 2000. According to figures from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, Catalan exports grew 9.5% between January and June, accounting for 25.3% of all Spanish exports, and amounting to a total of 35.6 billion euros in sales.  

The figures published on Tuesday show that the leading sector in Catalan exports was the chemical industry, whose sales went up by 8.2%, or 9.3 billion euros, accounting for 26.2% of the all Catalan exports in this period. Next came exports of manufacturing equipment, which grew 1.6% to 6.2 billion euros, followed by the automobile sector, whose exports rose by 5.8%, some 5.6 billion euros, to account for 15.7% of all exports. In June alone, exports grew 5.5%, the largest increase ever for a month of June.

Exports from Spain as a whole also grew in this first half of the year (10%) to 140.8 billion euros, which is also a record for the Spanish economy. However, imports into Spain also increased in this period by 11.8%, or a total amount of 151.9 billion euros.

According to the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, the growth in Catalan exports is higher than the Eurozone average (7.7%) and that of the European Union (7.9%). It is also slightly higher than other European countries, such as Italy (8%), Germany (6.1%) and France (3.5%).

Yet, imports into Catalonia also grew 9.3% in the first six months of 2017, leaving the current balance of trade at -8.2% compared to the same period last year.