With regard to trade in goods, South Korea has much more significance as a supplier than as a customer in Portugal.
In 2017, South Korea ranked 43rd in the global ranking of destination markets for Portuguese exports, being close to Saudi Arabia (40th), Hong Kong (41st), Australia (42th), Chile (44th) ), Egypt (45th) and India (46th).
As a supplier to Portugal, the Republic of Korea ranked 21st in the respective ranking in 2017, being close to Kazakhstan (18th), Ireland (19th), the Czech Republic (20th), Hungary (22nd), Equatorial Guinea ( 23rd) and Colombia (24th).
The sectors that stand out in Portuguese exports to South Korea are: plastics and rubber (38.9%), machinery and equipment (17.7%), common metals (5.9%), minerals and ores (5.9%) and footwear (5.3%). This group of products together represents around 74% of the global value of exports in 2017.
These figures showed increases of 16.2% in plastics and rubber and 66.9% in footwear, with increases in machinery and equipment, common metals and minerals and ores between 25% and 29%. It should be noted, however, that our sales of machines and devices to that country increased by only 2.8% from 2013 to 2017.
According to data from INE, the number of Portuguese companies exporting goods to South Korea has been increasing, around 580, corresponding to an increase of around 47% in recent years.
In Portuguese imports of products from South Korea, plastics and rubber occupy a 29.3% share; followed by common metals (19.6%), machines and devices (17.7%), vehicles and other transport material (14.8%) and chemicals (6.6%). These five product groups together accounted for 88% of the global value of our purchases of goods from South Korea.