EU trade with Russia has been strongly affected following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with the EU imposing import and export restrictions on several products. The effects of these measures have been particularly visible in the latest months, reads the recent data of EuroStat.
Considering seasonally adjusted values, both exports and imports dropped considerably below the levels prior to Russia's invasion. Russia’s share in EU’s extra-EU imports fell from 9.5% to 4.3% between February 2022 and December 2022. Over the same period, Russia’s share in the EU’s total extra-EU exports dropped from 4.0% to 2.0%.
The EU’s trade deficit with Russia peaked at €18.2 billion in March 2022 before progressively decreasing to €6.0 billion in December 2022. The value of imports from Russia fell by 53%, from €21.8 billion in March 2022 to €10.3 billion in December 2022.
With Russia being gradually replaced by other trade partners, Russia’s share in extra-EU imports for six key products decreased, with strong declines visible for coal, natural gas, fertilisers, petroleum oil and iron & steel.
In particular, the highest drops have been recorded for coal (from 45% in 2021 to 22% in 2022), natural gas (from 36% to 21%), fertilisers (from 29% to 22%), petroleum oil (from 28% to 21%) and iron & steel (from 16% to 10%).
