Armenia's foreign trade in January-August 2023 soared by 53% year-on-year to about $12 billion, according to the numbers released by the National Statistical Committee (NSC).
In 2023 August alone the foreign trade amounted to over $1.6 billion, 10% up from August 2022 and up 8.7% from July 2023.
Armenia's largest foreign trade partners among former Soviet republics were Russia (over $4.1 billion, up 56.3% compared to the first eight months of 2022), Belarus ($136.6 million, up 27.1%) and Ukraine ($61.5 million, up 18.1%).
Armenia's foreign trade with the EU countries grew by 36.7% to about 1.9 billion. The top five trade partners were Germany ($447.7 million up 57.4%), Italy ($285.2 million, up 39.5%), the Netherlands ($248.9 million, up 41.4%), Poland ($126.9 million, up 2.4 times) and France ($108.3 million, up 64%). Trade with Iran grew by 6% to $453.6 million and trade with Japan surged by 3.5 times to $276.6 million
Exports
Armenian exports grew by 51.8% to about $4.5 billion. In August 2023 alone, exports grew by 6.1% from August 2022 to $601.2 mln, and by 5.7% from July 2023.
Exports to Russia more than doubled to over $2.3 billion, exports to the EU states decreased by 5.3% to $516.1 million. The largest importers of Armenian goods were the Netherlands ($204.3 million, up 41.9%), Bulgaria ($71.3 million, down 59.5%) and Germany ($57.5 million, down 22.1%).
Export to UAE saw 2.6 –fold growth to $593.5 million, exports to China upped by 18.3% to $280.3 million and exports to Iraq dropped by 18.2% to $122.5 million.
The bulk of exports were precious and semi-precious stones, precious metals and articles - $934.8 million (up 83.5% compared to January-August 2022), machinery, equipment and mechanisms - $796.8 million, up 3.2 times, mining industry products - $593.2 million,(down 17.2%), food products - $560.5 million (up 8.4%) and land, air and water vehicles - $460 million, (up 6.1 times).
Imports
Imports to Armenia totaled over $7.5 billion, registering 53.8% growth compared to January-August 2022. Imports from Russia grew to almost about $2 billion, up 16.1%; imports from EU countries increased by 61.3% to over $1.5 billion. Imports from Germany grew by 66% to $396 million, imports from Italy upped by 58.5% to over $226.2 million. Also, imports from Georgia grew to $638 million, (up 66.7%), from the U.S. – to $630 million, (up 2.7 times), and from the Netherlands to $120 million, (up 2.7 times).
The bulk of imports were precious and semi-precious stones, precious metals and articles - $829 million, (2.3-fold growth), mining industry products - $730.9 million (3.5% decline), chemical products - $829 million (3.5% decline), machinery, equipment and mechanisms – over $1.6 billion (3.4% growth), ARKA reports.
