EU trade flows · extra-EU

All trade flows

Lactose

CN codes: 170211 · 170219

Latest customs month

May 2026

  • Imports · last 12 months

    29kt

    −23.2% vs the year before

  • Imports · avg unit value

    627€/t

  • Exports · last 12 months

    225kt

    −11.0% vs the year before

  • Exports · avg unit value

    1,877€/t

What the EU imports

Monthly imports

0.86 kt3.45 kt6.04 ktJan 2015Jan 2017Jan 2019Jan 2021Jan 2023Jan 2025
May 2026
12-month average2.42 kt
Imports0.84 kt
Imports12-month average

Where it comes from · last 12 months

  1. 🇬🇧United Kingdom27 kt93%
  2. 🇺🇸United States1.2 kt4%
  3. 🇮🇱Israel616 t2%
  4. 🇳🇿New Zealand64 t0%
  5. 🇮🇳India42 t0%
  6. 🇦🇪United Arab Emirates25 t0%
  7. 🇧🇷Brazil21 t0%
  8. 🇨🇭Switzerland19 t0%
  9. 🇨🇳China2 t0%
  10. 🇹🇷Türkiye0 t0%
  11. All other countries7 t0%

Partner concentration (HHI): 8,694 · high

Countries outside a product's top twelve are counted under "all other countries" — the totals and shares stay honest, the list stays readable.

What the EU exports

Monthly exports

13 kt20 kt27 ktJan 2015Jan 2017Jan 2019Jan 2021Jan 2023Jan 2025
May 2026
12-month average19 kt
Exports16 kt
Exports12-month average

Where it goes · last 12 months

  1. 🇨🇳China42 kt19%
  2. 🇮🇳India28 kt12%
  3. 🇳🇿New Zealand25 kt11%
  4. 🇯🇵Japan21 kt9%
  5. 🇮🇩Indonesia10 kt5%
  6. 🇨🇭Switzerland10 kt4%
  7. 🇹🇭Thailand8.8 kt4%
  8. 🇬🇧United Kingdom8.6 kt4%
  9. 🇷🇺Russia6.9 kt3%
  10. 🇿🇦South Africa6.9 kt3%
  11. All other countries47 kt21%

Partner concentration (HHI): 1,250 · low

Countries outside a product's top twelve are counted under "all other countries" — the totals and shares stay honest, the list stays readable.

Unit values

Declared value divided by declared weight, in euros per tonne — the closest thing a customs record has to a price. Import and export are not the same market: one is landed cost at the EU border, the other is border value on the way out.

€ 490€ 1,640€ 2,790Jan 2015Jan 2017Jan 2019Jan 2021Jan 2023Jan 2025
May 2026
Import unit value€ 1,643
Export unit value€ 1,949
Import unit valueExport unit value

The seasonal shape

The same twelve months laid over each other, per direction — this year drawn against the three before it, so a spring running ahead of last spring shows immediately.

Imports by month

147JFMAMJJASOND
December
20235 kt
20243 kt
20256 kt
2023202420252026kt

Exports by month

162126JFMAMJJASOND
December
202320 kt
202423 kt
202519 kt
2023202420252026kt

Across the Atlantic: the US record

The same product through American customs — the Census Bureau files about a month faster than Comext, in dollars, under its own ten-digit lines. Volumes compare on the HS6 root both nomenclatures share; the codes beneath it do not.

  • Exports · last 12 months

    425kt

    −1.2% vs the year before

  • Imports · last 12 months

    3.1kt

    −11.6% vs the year before

  • United States

    Jun 2026

Exports, 12-month average — EU vs US

16 kt27 kt38 ktJan 2015Jan 2017Jan 2019Jan 2021Jan 2023Jan 2025
Jun 2026
United States35 kt
EU-27United States

Where it comes from

  1. Germany1.8 kt · 57%
  2. Netherlands1.0 kt · 31%
  3. New Zealand0.2 kt · 7%
  4. Israel0.0 kt · 1%
  5. France0.0 kt · 1%

Where it goes

  1. China86 kt · 20%
  2. New Zealand73 kt · 17%
  3. Japan47 kt · 11%
  4. Mexico38 kt · 9%
  5. Indonesia27 kt · 6%

The same shipment, two customs records

Two customs services, one trade, and rarely the same number. Small gaps are timing and freight. Large ones mean something structural: an export is filed the moment the cargo leaves, while an import is only filed once customs clears it. Where the gap is wide, our reading is that goods are waiting in port for clearance, which can take a long time — but that is an assumption, not something the customs record proves. Re-exports, transshipment and differing tariff-line coverage sit in between as well. Neither book is wrong; knowing which one a counterparty is quoting is the point.

United States → Europe · May 2026

As the EU files it
1.2 kt
As the US files it
4.1 kt
Gap
+2.9 kt +71%

US quantities are aggregated from ten-digit HTS/Schedule B lines that differ from the EU's CN lines beneath the shared six-digit root; values stay in dollars on purpose. Lines filed in litres are converted at 1.03 kg/l.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, USA Trade Online — public domain, credited as a courtesy. Retrieved 14 Aug 2026.

Extra-EU trade of the EU-27 aggregate. Flows between member states are a separate record and are never mixed in.

Customs data is living data: recent months are provisional and can be revised for a year or more. Every revision the daily ingest sees is recorded, never silently overwritten.

Source: Eurostat (Comext, DS-045409), processing Get Fair Dairy — data vintage Jul 2026, last ingested 14 Aug 2026. · Sources & licences