The preliminary Thuringian foreign trade figures from the Federal Statistical Office for 2022 had been eagerly awaited: at the beginning of February, the time had come. The newly published figures once again confirm record values for Thuringian foreign trade. But how can this trend be explained?
According to Thuringian State Office for Statistics, the record values are still largely due to the sharply increased import and export prices, with import prices rising even more than export prices: In the annual average of 2022, import prices were 26.3 percent higher than in the previous year; export prices, on the other hand, only increased by 14.6 percent. These figures must be taken into account when assessing the overall development.
A special feature of Thuringia's foreign trade in 2022 is that the value of Thuringia's imports exceeded the value of its exports for the first time since 1999, by 2.2 percent. In the previous decade, Thuringia's exports were on average over 30 percent higher than its imports.
Which target markets and product groups were primarily responsible for Thuringia's foreign trade development?
In the ranking of Thuringia's export markets, the USA, Poland, France, China, and Austria occupied the top five positions – these are the same TOP-5 markets as in the previous year, but in a slightly different order. Together, these sales markets account for over 35 percent of Thuringia's total exports. In the USA, once again the most important export market for Thuringia, exports were increased by 16 percent. In particular, the relevant Thuringian export product groups “Machinery“, “Food and Animal Feed“, and “Metals“ contributed to the positive annual development.
With an import volume of 4.95 billion EUR, China was by far the most important Thuringian import market. Thus, more than a quarter of Thuringian imports came from the Middle Kingdom. The very positive development in value of Thuringia's total imports was largely generated by Thuringia's most important import goods group, "Electrical Equipment“, whose imports rose by 157 percent.
