Trade lanes

What Belgium buys, and from whom.

Belgium imported USD 310bn of manufactured and processed goods in 2024, down 6 per cent on 2022. These are its twenty largest source countries. 33 of them ship enough, across enough product lines, to have a lane page of their own.

Trade year 2024, compared with 2022.

By source

The twenty countries Belgium imports most from.

A lane page is written where the source ships USD 1bn or more a year across at least 50 product lines worth USD 1m each. For what Belgium is best placed to make itself, see Made here: Belgium.

  1. 1

    Germany

    Share of Belgium's imports16 per cent
    Changedown 6 per cent on 2022
    USD 49bnin 2024
  2. 2

    Netherlands

    Share of Belgium's imports14 per cent
    Changeup 1 per cent on 2022
    USD 44bnin 2024
  3. 3

    France

    Share of Belgium's imports11 per cent
    Changeup 2 per cent on 2022
    USD 35bnin 2024
  4. 4

    United States

    Share of Belgium's imports7 per cent
    Changedown 2 per cent on 2022
    USD 22bnin 2024
  5. 5

    China

    Share of Belgium's imports6 per cent
    Changedown 17 per cent on 2022
    USD 20bnin 2024
  6. 6

    Italy

    Share of Belgium's imports6 per cent
    Changedown 19 per cent on 2022
    USD 17bnin 2024
  7. 7

    United Kingdom

    Share of Belgium's imports4 per cent
    Changeup 4 per cent on 2022
    USD 13bnin 2024
  8. 8

    Ireland

    Share of Belgium's imports4 per cent
    Changedown 25 per cent on 2022
    USD 12bnin 2024
  9. 9

    Spain

    Share of Belgium's imports3 per cent
    Changeup 22 per cent on 2022
    USD 9.5bnin 2024
  10. 10

    Japan

    Share of Belgium's imports2 per cent
    Changedown 5 per cent on 2022
    USD 7.4bnin 2024
  11. 11

    Poland

    Share of Belgium's imports2 per cent
    Changedown 5 per cent on 2022
    USD 7.3bnin 2024
  12. 12

    Sweden

    Share of Belgium's imports2 per cent
    Changeup 20 per cent on 2022
    USD 7.0bnin 2024
  13. 13

    Switzerland

    Share of Belgium's imports2 per cent
    Changeup 17 per cent on 2022
    USD 6.0bnin 2024
  14. 14

    Czech Republic

    Share of Belgium's imports2 per cent
    Changeup 9 per cent on 2022
    USD 5.4bnin 2024
  15. 15

    South Korea

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changedown 15 per cent on 2022
    USD 3.7bnin 2024
  16. 16

    Turkey

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changedown 3 per cent on 2022
    USD 3.6bnin 2024
  17. 17

    India

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changedown 17 per cent on 2022
    USD 3.4bnin 2024
  18. 18

    Austria

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changeup 12 per cent on 2022
    USD 3.3bnin 2024
  19. 19

    Hungary

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changedown 5 per cent on 2022
    USD 2.9bnin 2024
  20. 20

    South Africa

    Share of Belgium's imports1 per cent
    Changedown 20 per cent on 2022
    USD 2.3bnin 2024
What this record says

What crossed the border, what it was worth, and what it weighed.

Every figure on this page is from CEPII's BACI file, which reconciles what each pair of countries reports to the UN about the same shipment. Trade year 2024, compared with 2022. A line is one six-digit customs heading (HS 2022). Values are in US dollars at the border; growth is in current dollars, so part of any change is price, not volume.

Unit value. Unit values are customs values per tonne, declared at the border, not product prices. It is the value of a line divided by its declared weight, so it mixes grades, models and qualities under one heading. It is shown only where the weight is recorded, at least three source countries of USD 100k or more ship the line to Belgium with a weight, and the figure sits within a factor of five of the middle of those sources. Outside that band it is treated as a recording problem and left out.

Share is Germany's part of everything Belgium imported in that line, from every source. Sources counts the countries that shipped any of it.

Scope. Manufactured and processed goods, customs chapters 16 to 96, without ores, fuels, precious metals, scrap, raw farm output and one-off capital and defence purchases: the same rule as the Made here pages.

What it does not say

A record of trade, not a shopping list.

What this record does not say: what sells at retail, what margin a trade leaves, how crowded the marketplaces are, or how much of a flow is re-exported through entrepots such as Hong Kong and Singapore.

A large line is not proof of an opening, and a lower unit value from another country is not proof the goods are the same. Tariffs, standards, freight, payment terms, lead times and the plain fact that a supplier is good at it are all invisible here. Nothing on this page is a forecast, a recommendation or a promise. No supplier company is named, because the record holds none.

Source: CEPII BACI, HS22, version 202601. Edition of 2026-11-03.