India’s trade growth remains buoyant thanks to strong ocean trade

• Ocean imports and exports maintain momentum as
  key industries experience recovery, causing trade growth index to rise
  significantly
• India is the only country in the Global Trade
  Barometer with a positive trade outlook for the next quarter

MUMBAI, INDIA�- Media OutReach - 6 December 2019
– Strong ocean imports
and exports will sustain India’s trade growth over the three-month period
ending in January 2020, making it the only country out of the world’s seven
largest economies with a positive trade outlook according to data from the DHL
Global Trade Barometer released by DHL, the world’s leading logistics company.

The DHL Global Trade Barometer, an early indicator of global
trade developments calculated using Artificial Intelligence and Big Data,
predict mildly positive growth for Indian trade with the country’s Index rising
five points to 54.[1]
The positive outlook is driven primarily by an uptake in ocean imports of Basic
& Industrial Raw Materials and Chemicals & Products, coupled with a
gradual revival in air exports of Consumer Fashion Goods.[2]
In total, ocean trade grew by 10 points, maintaining India’s positive outlook
even as air trade forecasts experience relative weakness.

 ”India has the strongest trade
forecast this quarter and the highest index value of all countries in the
latest Global Trade Barometer survey, followed closely by the United Kingdom
and Japan,” said Niki Frank, CEO, DHL Global Forwarding India. “This highlights
the underlying potential of India’s economy, which will benefit from the
government’s plan to invest US$1.39 trillion (€1.26 trillion) in
infrastructure projects. The country’s commitment to establishing itself as a
strategic maritime hub with initiatives and investments in coastal infrastructure appear to be
supporting the Index’s positive ocean trade outlook and will likely also
contribute positively to longer-term trade growth.”

Steady but mild decline negatively affects all
countries, except India

The Barometer’s results also suggest that world trade is
expected to continue at moderate pace but further contract for the next three
months, driven by minor decreases in both air and containerized ocean trade.
Against previous quarters this year, the downward trend in trade growth remains
mostly stable, neither indicating an acceleration of the decline nor a
bottoming out of contractionary movement. All seven nations monitored by the
Barometer received indexes below 50 points except for India, where the
Barometer forecasts moderate growth of five points to 54 points for India. While Japan and the UK had been the only
countries with positive trade outlooks in the previous update in September, the
two countries record the highest losses in this period.

“According
to the DHL Global Trade Barometer the year will probably end with moderate
world trade. However, we’ve to bear in mind where we come from: The rapid
growth world trade has undergone in recent years was like climbing the Mount
Everest. Now, we are on the descent, but we are still breathing altitude air”,
Tim Scharwath, CEO of DHL Global Forwarding, Freight, says. “A countless number
of stable trade relations continues to flourish worldwide, despite smouldering
trade conflicts and geopolitical uncertainties.”

About the Global Trade Barometer

Launched in January 2018, the DHL Global Trade Barometer is
an innovative and unique early indicator for the current state and future
development of global trade. It is based on large amounts of logistics data
that are evaluated with the help of artificial intelligence. The indicator is
published four times a year and the next release date is scheduled for end of
March 2020.

For more information on the DHL Global Trade Barometer,
please visit:  logisticsofthings.dhl/gtb.
The
index is now also available for subscribers of the Bloomberg terminal by using
the code “DHLG “.

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