Poland overcomes Italy

For the first time in the history of German foreign trade, in 2020 Poland surpassed Italy in both exports and imports with Germany, relegating the Belpaese to sixth position, behind the Poles. Even the French continue to lose ground and in 2020 they will have another gigantic trade deficit with the Germans, how much longer will the French be able to go on with numbers like that? A non-trivial question, on the answer to which depends the sustainability of the single currency. Data from Destatis.de

The People's Republic of China was again Germany's most important trading partner in 2020 for the fifth year in a row. As reported by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), according to preliminary data, goods worth 212.1 billion euros were exchanged between the two countries in 2020. Despite the crisis caused by the Coronavirus, the volume of foreign trade with China still increased by 3.0% compared to 2019. It is followed in second place among the most important trading partners by the Netherlands with a total turnover from foreign trade of 172.8 billion euros (-8.7%) and the USA with 171.6 billion euros (-9.7%).

Main trading partners of Germany in 2020

Germany's top 10 trading partners by imports and exports

As of 2015, China remains the largest importer

The importance of China for German imports is growing steadily: in 1980, China was ranked 35th in the list of importing countries, in 1990 it was already 14th. Since 2015, the People's Republic of China has been the state from which most German imports arrive. In 2020, goods worth 116.3 billion euros were imported from China. Imports also increased by 5.6% compared to 2019. The Netherlands (with 88.5 billion euros) and the United States (with 67.8 billion euros) were the second and third largest import countries in 2020. The crisis caused by the Coronavirus, however, led to significant declines: imports from the Netherlands compared to 2019 decreased by 9.6% while those from the United States decreased by 5.0%.

Top 10 trading partners by sum of imports and exports and top 10 German trade surpluses

The United States still remains the most important customer for German exports

The majority of German exports also went to the United States in 2020, as has been the case since 2015, even though exports of goods to America decreased by 12.5% compared to 2019 to EUR 103.8 billion. The People's Republic of China is in second place in the ranking of importing countries with 95.9 billion euros (-0.1%) while France is in third place with 91.1 billion euros (-14.6%).

Germany had the largest trade surpluses in 2020 with the United States (36.1 billion euros), France (34.4 billion euros) and the United Kingdom (32.2 billion euros). In contrast, the 2020 foreign trade balance with the Republic of China showed a trade deficit: overall, the value of goods imported from China exceeded the value of goods exported by €20.4 billion.