Bananas, HS Code 0803; Import-Export Profile of Global and U.S. Trade

Bananas

Bananas, HS code 0803, are an essential part of many American’s diet, yet these fruits grow in the tropics and must be shipped a long distance to world markets. The United States only produces .008 million metric tones of bananas a year. India, the world’s leader, produced 26.2 million metric tones of bananas in 2009.

Top world producers of bananas by country 2009 India, China, Brazil, Costa Rico chart

They are followed by the Philippines, China, Ecuador, Brazil, Indonesia, and Mexico. Costa Rica is the world’s eight largest producer of bananas and Whole Food Market Inc main supplier (click here for Whole Food Market’s Import Trade Profile).

 Top Exporters of Bananas by Country

Ecuador, the fourth largest producer of bananas, is the world’s top exporter, consuming 43% of the world’s market. In 2009 alone Ecuador secured 6.66 billion dollars worth of banana sales abroad. Colombia, Ecuador’s closest neighboring country and the ninth largest producer, was the world’s second largest supplier of bananas, accounting for 25% of the world’s foreign banana market with a 3.8 billion dollar worth. Philippines is the only other country pulling in more than a billion dollars of banana sales per year, accounting for 19% of the world’s market.

World’s top banana exporters by country: Ecuador, Columbia, Philippines pie chart graph percentage 2009 dollar amount shipments annual

World’s Top Banana Importers

Ever wonder where all those bananas at the market come from? Well the United States is the world’s largest importer of bananas. In 2009 alone the United States spent 3.1 billion dollars on foreign bananas. United States bought 20% of all the world’s for-sale bananas. Other northern industrialized nations followed. Germany imported 12% of the available bananas, Italy 8%, Russia and Belgium 6% a piece, Canada and the Netherlands 5% a piece, France and the United Kingdom 4% each, and Japan 3%. Just these 10 countries make up 75% of the world’s banana buying market.

Seventy-five percent of the world’s import market bananas by country United States com trade pie chart Germany 2009 dollar amount graph

The United States receives 96% of its bananas from South America. This is not surprising since the strongest banana world growers and exporters are located there. Also notable is the relatively short distance from South America to the United States. The estimated 2010 value was 1.7 billion dollars of imported bananas from this region. More interestingly we can gain access to the top companies selling bananas to the United States. Using PIERS Prospects we can pull up the top 26 companies exporting bananas into the States. We can see that the largest company is Union De Bananeros Ecuatorianos Sa. We can view individual companies’ telephone numbers and address. Within the program individual company profiles also exist. Provided for your convenience is an excel data sheet filled with leads of companies. The top banana sellers exporting to the United States are all in this file (download here). This data set includes sales, phone numbers, number of employees, company presidents, etc.

Top foreign sellers of bananas companies by region value to United States imports data shipment waterborne value money sales list

• ©WorldTradeDaily.com®  All rights reserved. Robert Thompson, Editor-in-Chief.  Louisa Avery, Editor.  Isaac Thompson, Research Writer.
• Check out our commercially available technologies, products and services. Contact: Robert@WorldTradeDaily.com
• For discounted subscriptions to PIERS Prospects and Stats Plus contact: Aliet Martinez: amartinez@piers.com and mention “World Trade Daily”.