Trade glossary · mechanics

Transit trade

Goods that pass through a country en route to a third country, without entering the local market.

Transit goods physically cross a country's territory but are not consumed or transformed there. They may or may not be recorded in trade statistics, depending on whether customs treats the transit zone as inside the customs territory. Switzerland, for example, has a special regime for goods transiting toward landlocked Austria and the EU.

Examples

  • Goods moving from China through Russia by rail to Poland.
  • Goods sailing through Egyptian ports of Said and Alexandria toward Israel and Jordan.

Related terms

Re-exports
Goods imported into a country and then exported in the same form, without significant transformation. Inflates trade volumes for hub economies like Hong Kong, Singapore, and the Netherlands.
Entrepôt trade
Trade through a hub port or warehouse where goods are stored and re-exported. Common in Singapore, Hong Kong, the Netherlands (Rotterdam), and the UAE.