Press release No. 024 of 20 January 2025

• Goods to the value of 20.1 billion euros exported to Japan
• Pharmaceutical products most important export goods
• Imports from Japan down 12.2% compared with the same period a year earlier

WIESBADEN – Goods to the value of 20.1 billion euros were exported from Germany to Japan in the period from January to November 2024. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reports that exports therefore rose by 7.5% compared with the same period a year earlier. In the first eleven months of 2024, Germany exported goods to the total value of 1,441.4 billion euros (-1.3% compared with January to November 2023). Accounting for a 1.4% share in total exports, Japan ranked 18th among Germany’s most important trading partners in terms of exports.

Pharmaceutical products most important export goods

In the first eleven months of 2024, pharmaceutical products were the most important export goods in trade with Japan, with a 26.3% share (5.3 billion euros) in total exports to Japan. The second and third most important export goods in trade with Japan were motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers (4.4 billion euros; 21.7% share) and machinery (2.4 billion euros; 11.7% share).

Imports from Japan down 12.2%

Goods to the value of 20.9 billion euros were imported to Germany from Japan in the period from January to November 2024. This was a decrease of 12.2% compared with the same period a year earlier. The most important import goods were computers and optical products accounting for 4.3 billion euros (20.6% share in total imports from Japan), followed by machinery to the value of 3.8 billion euros (18.1% share) and motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers to the value of 2.8 billion euros (13.5% share). Accounting for 1.7% of total imports to Germany, Japan ranked 17th among Germany’s most important trading partners.

Germany recorded an import surplus of 0.8 billion euros in trade with Japan from January to November 2024.

More information:

All detailed results on German foreign trade in reference month November 2024 are available in the GENESIS-Online database (tables 51000). Selected tables are also provided on the “Foreign trade“ page on the website of the Federal Statistical Office.

Foreign trade results are also available on Dashboard Germany at www.dashboard-deutschland.de (only in German). In this data portal, the Federal Statistical Office brings together up-to-date indicators from official statistics producers and other data providers on the topics of the labour market, construction, housing, energy and Ukraine. The portal also contains the Economic Pulse Monitor (Pulsmesser für die Wirtschaft) (only in German) tool for real-time economic monitoring.

Important information regarding the GENESIS-Online database:

Our database's new user interface has been available as the main interface version since November 2024. The old interface can still be used to retrieve data for large tables as this is not yet possible in the new version.