Exports of the Spanish agro-food sector exceeded 50 billion euro in 2017
Foreign sales of agricultural products (food and non-food) and the food industry rose to just over 50 billion euro during last year.
As regard only the export of food, beverages and tobacco, the amount was 45.78 billion euro, 6.3% more than in 2016, while imports increased by 7.6% to 34.67 billion euro.
These figures resulted in a surplus of 11.28 billion euro (+2.4%) only regarding food.
73.5% of all exports went to the EU (+6.3%) while the remaining 26.5% went to third countries (+8.3%).
Fruit and vegetables continued leading by far the exports (17.24 billion euro) although its rise was slight (+2.3%). Besides that, this increase was lower than that of imports (+4.2%; 5.32 billion euro), a situation which "worries a lot" the sectoral organization FEPEX.
Exports that increased the most were those of fishery products (+11.9%), fats and oils (+15.8%) and dairy products and eggs (+15.9%).
With regards to imports, fishery products grew by 10%, fats and oils by 28.4% and dairy products and eggs by 12.9%.
Source: Agronegocios