Warsaw, 15 August 2024
The UK’s Office of National Statistics today published data for trade in goods for the month of June 2024, the second month since the start of physical border checks on animal- and plant-based products from the EU. The veterinary and phytosanitary checks were introduced on 30 April under the UK government’s Border Target Operating Model (BTOM), implemented under the Trade & Cooperation Agreement between the UK and EU.
The first month of the border checks saw a 7.0% month-on-month fall in the value of imports from the EU. The key question was whether that fall would persist going forward, or whether trade would bounce back once importers and exporters got used to the new procedures.
Today’s news is good. Trade has indeed bounced back, by 7.4% month on month. The value of EU goods imported into the UK in June was £27 billion, compared to £25 billion in May, almost back to April 2024 levels.
For Polish exporters, the news is better. They saw only a 3.2% month-on-month fall in May, followed by a 9.0% rise in June. This has led to the second quarter of 2024 seeing an all-time record value of Polish goods entering the UK (£3.6 billion), June itself being a historic record high for a single month (£1.3 billion).
The figures suggest that many UK importers and EU importers may have held back deliveries in May, waiting for the new procedures to bed in, and having done so, are catching up with orders.
The full dataset is available on the ONS website for downloading here.
Meanwhile, Polish trade data released on Tuesday shows that the UK is the only country in Poland’s Top Five export markets to show growth. The value of Polish goods sold to Germany, Czechia, France and Italy in the first half of 2024 has declined year on year, while the value of Polish goods sold to the UK has soared by 8.1% compared to the first half of 2023, to €9.4 billion.
“This is evidence that the UK remains an important and absorbent market for Polish goods, and that Polish businesses focused on expanding into foreign markets should see the UK as offering a great opportunity right now,” said Michael Dembinski, the chief advisor to the British Polish Chamber of Commerce.
