In the Dark

• In 2018, UK exports to Ireland were worth £35.1 billion; imports from Ireland were £21.6 billion, resulting in a trade surplus of £13.5 billion with Ireland.
• The UK had a surplus with Ireland in both goods and services.
• Ireland accounted for 5.5% of UK exports and 3.2% of all UK imports.
• Ireland was the UK’s 5^th largest export market and the 10^th largest source of imports.
• The UK has recorded a trade surplus with Ireland every year between 1999 and 2018.

Brexiter logic states that the fact that the EU exports more to the UK than vice versa means that the EU needs the UK more than the UK needs the EU. Applying the same argument to Ireland would imply that the UK needs Ireland more than Ireland needs the UK (if it were correct). The reality is that membership of the single market has been of benefit to the economy of both countries (and the rest of the EU). Trade is not a zero-sum game. While the Single Market has allowed the UK to generate a trading surplus with Ireland, Ireland has found other opportunities elsewhere to more than make up. Contrary to popular myth, the UK now only accounts for a small fraction of goods exports from Ireland.

As the United Kingdom has left the European Union it must now try to negotiate new trading arrangements that will cover trade with remaining member states, including Ireland. No doubt the EU negotiators will be pressed by Ireland to take steps to reduce the imbalance described above. As the UK no longer wants to avail itself of the benefits of Single Market, it seems likely that other EU member states will want to seize the opportunity to boost their trade by filling the gaps.

Since the UK’s trading agreement with the EU (if there ever is one, which is doubtful) will probably not include services, I thought it would be interesting to look at goods: here is a summary of the breakdown of this category of UK exports to Ireland:

`Miscellaneous manufactured articles’, incidentally, means things made out of plastic, etc.

As a relatively recent arrival in Ireland I find these figures quite interesting in light of my own experience of shopping here. I know that consumer goods aren’t representative of all trade so this is just a comment on my own impressions and is not to be taken too seriously.

If you go into a Supermarket in Ireland you will find that fresh vegetables, meat and dairy products are generally all from local sources. There is a wide choice of these items and value for money is generally very good. The same is true for bread and bread-related products. Some fruit is imported from the EU (especially France and The Netherlands, but including some, e.g. apples, from the UK) and some from further afield (e.g. bananas from the Caribbean and Latin America). You will be shocked to learn that bendy bananas are freely available.

Moving to processed foods (including confectionery, canned items, etc) the picture changes quite a bit. There are local Irish brands but they tend to be alongside familiar British ones. There are also items from elsewhere, e.g. from Italy, that I have never seen on sale in the UK. The (smaller) Irish brands of, say, marmalade seem to be a bit dearer than their imported equivalent but are often of better quality.

As an aside I’ll also mention that supermarkets here have a noticeably smaller range of convenience foods (e.g. microwave meals and ready-made sandwiches) than in corresponding outlets in the UK.

I’ve been impressed at the quality and availability of another important staple, wine. There is a better range of French, Spanish and Italian wines in Supervalu in Ireland, especially at the quality end of the spectrum, than in stores of a similar size in the United Kingdom. There is also a good range of wines from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Latin America. I haven’t tried Irish wine yet…

In summary, then, it’s perfectly easy to eat and drink well in Ireland without buying any British products. For myself, I have always tried to buy local food products whenever possible to support the Irish economy as best I can.

Elsewhere in the store however you can see a much greater dominance of UK products. This is particularly true of toiletries (including toothpaste, shampoo), pharmaceutical goods, domestic cleaning products and so on. These tend to be dominated by familiar British brands, although they seem to be more expensive here in Ireland than in the UK.

None of the goods mentioned in the previous paragraph are at all perishable so they could in principle be quite easily be imported from further afield. I wonder if we’ll soon start seeing products of this sort starting to appear from elsewhere?