Netherlands: Stronger international position in supply and starting material

The Dutch Agribusiness increases market share outside of Europe in fast growing countries, such as Turkey, Western Balkans and China, to strengthen its position in the international trade in supply and starting material, but loses opportunities in Africa, in North and South America, India and Japan, where import of these products increases more quickly than the increase of the Dutch supply to these countries/

regions. This is clear from the LEI-report in which the present position of and opportunities for the Dutch agribusiness on international markets are being looked at.

 

According to the LEI-report the Dutch agricultural export increased during the last 15 years from US$44 to US$84 billion in 2010. World trade, however, grew stronger as a result of which, with the exception of the product group Starting Material, the Netherlands lost market share.

 

The share of the Netherlands is almost 7% on the international agrarian markets. The Dutch market share of the (more) knowledge intensive product groups Starting Material and Fresh Final Products is still (considerably) bigger.

 

Compared to the average make-up of worldwide trading streams the categories Final Products and Starting Material are relatively large in the Dutch export and those of semi-finished relatively small. This means that the Netherlands, compared to other countries, export many knowledge intensive agrarian products with a high surplus value.

 

The most important sales markets are close-by in Western Europe. The Netherlands in countries such as Germany, Belgium/Luxemburg, France and the United Kingdom has a large share (between 14 and 24%) of the total agrarian import of these countries.

For semi-manufactured and Primary/unworked products the Netherlands, according to LEI, lose share on the markets outside of Europe; this is not compensated sufficiently by the growth in sales in Europe.