Lao PDR - Merchandise exports to low- and middle-income economies within region (% of total merchandise exports)

Merchandise exports to low- and middle-income economies within region (% of total merchandise exports) in Lao PDR was 84.94 as of 2020. Its highest value over the past 60 years was 99.46 in 1960, while its lowest value was 16.95 in 1963.

Definition: Merchandise exports to low- and middle-income economies within region are the sum of merchandise exports from the reporting economy to other low- and middle-income economies in the same World Bank region as a percentage of total merchandise exports by the economy. Data are computed only if at least half of the economies in the partner country group had non-missing data. No figures are shown for high-income economies, because they are a separate category in the World Bank classification of economies.

Source: World Bank staff estimates based data from International Monetary Fund's Direction of Trade database.

See also:

Year Value
1960 99.46
1962 38.90
1963 16.95
1964 20.41
1965 75.00
1967 95.27
1968 91.42
1969 98.75
1970 64.35
1971 90.57
1972 93.88
1973 95.18
1974 83.60
1981 62.96
1982 72.81
1983 71.20
1984 50.48
1985 58.65
1986 71.54
1987 64.71
1988 67.62
1989 56.58
1990 77.49
1991 58.41
1992 46.33
1993 51.31
1994 55.43
1995 57.78
1996 79.54
1997 18.09
1998 41.94
1999 51.86
2000 53.16
2001 50.40
2002 50.46
2003 51.44
2004 49.09
2005 61.38
2006 72.13
2007 70.94
2008 74.71
2009 77.49
2010 80.36
2011 80.42
2012 77.15
2013 80.93
2014 87.02
2015 83.44
2016 81.58
2017 81.40
2018 85.16
2019 84.48
2020 84.94

Development Relevance: The relative importance of intraregional trade is higher for both landlocked countries and small countries with close trade links to the largest regional economy. For most low- and middle-income economies - especially smaller ones - there is a "geographic bias" favoring intraregional trade. Despite the broad trend toward globalization and the reduction of trade barriers, the relative share of intraregional trade increased for most economies between 1999 and 2010. This is due partly to trade-related advantages, such as proximity, lower transport costs, increased knowledge from repeated interaction, and cultural and historical affinity. The direction of trade is also influenced by preferential trade agreements that a country has made with other economies. Though formal agreements on trade liberalization do not automatically increase trade, they nevertheless affect the direction of trade between the participating economies.

Limitations and Exceptions: Data on exports and imports are from the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) Direction of Trade database and should be broadly consistent with data from other sources, such as the United Nations Statistics Division's Commodity Trade (Comtrade) database. All high-income economies and major low- and middle-income economies report trade data to the IMF on a timely basis, covering about 85 percent of trade for recent years. Trade data for less timely reporters and for countries that do not report are estimated using reports of trading partner countries. Therefore, data on trade between developing and high-income economies should be generally complete. But trade flows between many low- and middle-income economies - particularly those in Sub-Saharan Africa - are not well recorded, and the value of trade among low- and middle-income economies may be understated.

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Private Sector & Trade Indicators

Sub-Topic: Exports