WHAT IS TRADE?

Trade involves the transfer of the ownership of goods or services from one person or entity to another in
exchange for other goods or services or for money. Possible synonyms of "trade" include "commerce" and
"financial transaction".
A network that allows trade is called a market.

INTERNATIONAL TRADE
International trade is the exchange of goods and services between countries. This type of trade
gives rise to a world economy, in which prices, or supply and demand, affect and are affected by
global events.
Trading globally gives consumers and countries the opportunity to be exposed to goods and
services not available in their own countries. Almost every kind of product can be found on the
international market: food, clothes, spare parts, oil, jewelry, wine, stocks, currencies and water.
Services are also traded: tourism, banking, consulting and transportation. A product that is sold to
the global market is an export, and a product that is bought from the global market is an import.
Imports and exports are accounted for in a country's current account in the balance of payments.

INCREASED EFFICIENCY OF TRADING GLOBALLY

Global trade allows wealthy countries to use their resources - whether labor, technology or
capital - more efficiently. Because countries are endowed with different assets and natural
resources (land, labor, capital and technology), some countries may produce the same good more
efficiently and therefore sell it more cheaply than other countries. If a country cannot efficiently
produce an item, it can obtain the item by trading with another country that can. This is known as
specialization in international trade.

BANGLADESH, TRADE AND HER PARTNERS:

Bangladesh launched a deep and wide-ranging trade reform strategy in the early 1990s. This included
substantial reduction and rationalization of tariffs, removal of quantitative restrictions, move from
multiple to a unified exchange rate system, convertible current account and an overall outward orientation
of trade policy regime. As a result, the countrys trade integration, measured by the trade-GDP ratio, rose
from 18% in 1990 to 43% in 2008.
Bangladesh is the 65th largest export economy in the world and the 111th most complex economy
according to the Economic Complexity Index (ECI).

Bangladesh trades with more than 120 countries and earned 61 st place in international trade ranking.
Bangladeshi international trade is extremely small relative to the size of its population, although it
experienced accelerated growth during the last decade. It is not very diversified and depends on the
fluctuations of the international market.

TOP EXPORT & IMPORT PRODUCTS

To import and export of Bangladeshi products are described below:

EXPORTS
The top exports of Bangladesh are Non-Knit Men's Suits, Knit T-shirts, Knit Sweaters, Non-Knit
Women's Suits and Non-Knit Men's Shirts, using the 1992 revision of the h.s. (harmonized system)
classification.
The following export product groups represent the highest dollar value in Bangladeshi global shipments
during 2014. Also shown is the percentage share each export category represents in terms of Bangladeshs
overall exports.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

Knit or crochet clothing: US$14.3 billion (43.2% of total exports)

Clothing (not knit or crochet): $13.8 billion (41.5%)
Other textiles, worn clothing: $1 billion (3%)
Fish: $657.6 million (1.98%)
Footwear: $655 million (1.97%)
Paper yarn, woven fabric: $589.2 million (1.8%)
Raw hides excluding furskins: $406.4 million (1.2%)
Headgear: $213.3 million (0.6%)
Leather, animal gut articles: $141.4 million (0.4%)
Tobacco: $105.6 million (0.3%)

Among the top 10 Bangladeshi exports above, headgear showed the greatest increase in value since 2010
up 363.3%. Exported items made from leather and animal gut were up 214.5% while footwear exports
moved ahead 159.6% over the 5-year period ending in 2014.

IMPORTS
The top imports of Bangladesh are Refined Petroleum, Heavy Pure Woven Cotton, Raw Cotton,
Light Pure Woven Cotton and Non-Retail Pure Cotton Yarn etc.
In 2014 imports into Bangladesh amounted to US$38.5 billion, up 26.2% from 2010 and a one-year
uptick of 9.6% since 2013. Bangladeshs top 10 imports accounted for 61% of the overall value of its
global purchases.

The following import product groups represent the highest dollar value in Bangladeshi global purchases
during 2014. Also shown is the percentage share each import category represents in terms of
Bangladeshs overall imports.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

Cotton: US$5.2 billion (13.4% of total imports)

Machines, engines, pumps: $4.3 billion (11.1%)
Electronic equipment: $2.7 billion (7.1%)
Oil: $2.5 billion (6.5%)
Iron and steel: $1.8 billion (4.6%)
Plastics: $1.5 billion (4.0%)
Animal/vegetable fats and oils: $1.5 billion (3.9%)
Manmade staple fibers: $1.4 billion (3.7%)
Vehicles: $1.3 billion (3.4%)
Cereals: $1.2 billion (3.2%)

Among the top 10 Bangladeshi imports above, manmade staple fibers showed the greatest increase in
value since 2010 up 54.6% perhaps not surprising given that Bangladeshs booming export output is
dominated by clothing products.

EXPORT FROM BANGLADESH: TOP FIVE COUNTRIES

USA
Germany
UK
France
Spain

IMPORT IN BANGLADESH: TOP FIVE COUNTRIES

China
India
Singapore
Malaysia
South Korea

EXPORT FROM BANGLADESH: TOP FIVE COUNTRIES

Value in million Tk.
(Value in million US $)

Countries/Year
USA
Germany
UK
France
Spain

2009-10
273293.37
(3950.47)
200581.36
(2563.34)
104361
(1508.54)
70935.55
(1031.04)
63459.55
(824.15)

2010-11
363502.48
(5107.52)
262583.20
(3355.69)
146992.88
(2065.38)
70969.68
1025.87
66429.98
(859.49)

2011-12
363502.48
(5107.52)
267520.78
(3418.80)
193365.49
(2444.57)
109673.35
1537.98
72678.06
(931.77)

2012-13
433134.59
(5419.60)
303946.18
(3847.42)
220971.21
(2764.91)
109187.43
1380.37
75789.24
(974.28)

2013-14
433959.02
(5583.62)
339583.10
(4244.79)
226503.76
(2917.735)
120990.09
1513.89
83430.72
(1062.26)

The top exports products of Bangladesh within above 5 countries are Non-Knit Men's Suits ($5.08B),
Knit T-shirt ($4.78), Knit Sweaters ($3.91B), and Non-Knit Mens Shirts ($2.2B), using the 1992 revision
of the HS (Harmonized System) classification. Its top imports are Refined Petroleum ($2.03B), Heavy
Pure Woven Cotton ($1.41B), and Raw Cotton.
6000

5000

4000
USA
Germany

3000

UK
France

2000

Spain

1000

2009-10

2010-11

2011-12

2012-13

2013-14

From last 5 years data, we saw that the total export of products to above 5 countries is increased which is
satisfactory for the country.

IMPORT IN BANGLADESH: TOP FIVE COUNTRIES

Value in million Tk.
(Value in million US $)

Country/Year
China
India
Singapore
Malaysia
S. Korea

2009-10
237461
(3451.47)
221573
(3202.1)
121658.4
(1768.29)
47761.00
(691.59)
59497.2
(864.78)

2010-11
264217.9
(3819.28)
324832
(4560)
107276.04
(1550.68)
85235.1
(1232.07)
58024.4
(838.75)

2011-12
420796
(5912.55)
376428.5
(4758.89)
92125.39
(1291.90)
125717.2
(1766.44)
80324.8
(1128.63)

2012-13
508867
(6433.21)
381598
(4776.9)
135230.3
(1709.61)
110688.6
(1399.35)
122969.7
(1554.61)

2013-14
505460
(6324)
469080
(6035.5)
113620
(1421.9)
152325
(1902.1)
103610
(1265.3)

The top imports products of Bangladesh from above 5 countries are Frozen Food ($43.29M), AgriProducts (138.853M), Chemical products ($4.619M), Leather ($118.001M), Raw jute ($60.033M), Jute
goods ($89.887M), Knitwear ($175.402), Woven garments ($277.733M), Tea ($1.022M), Home Textile
($14.79M), Footwear ($5.329M), Bicycle ($2.641M) and Others ($433.271M).
1800
1600
1400
1200

China

1000

India

800

S ingapore

600

Malays ia
S . Korea

400
200
0
2009-10

2010-11

2011-12

2012-13

2013-14

Here we saw that, the total import from those countries fluctuate overtime. That means Bangladesh tries
to maintain local factors of production as further production and local product to reduce the dependency
to others.

REFERENCES:

http://www.worldstopexports.com/bangladeshs-top-10-exports/
http://www.worldstopexports.com/bangladeshs-top-10-imports/
http://www.dhaka.diplo.de/contentblob/2329998/Daten/5301563/ExportImportBGD.pdf