Concentration and diversification indices of merchandise exports and imports by country, annual, 2014

Description

This table provides information on number of exported/imported products, concentration and diversification indices by country. The concentration index shows how exports and imports of individual countries or group of countries are concentrated on several products or otherwise distributed in a more homogeneous manner among a series of products. The diversification index signals whether the structure of exports or imports by product of a given country or group of countries differ from the structure of product of the world.

1. Concentration index:
Concentration index, also knows as Herfindahl-Hirschmann Index (Product HHI), is a measure of the degree of product concentration. An index value closer to 1 indicates a country's exports or imports are highly concentrated on a few products. On the contrary, values closer to 0 reflect exports or imports are more homogeneously distributed among a series of products.

2. Diversification index:
The diversification index is computed by measuring the absolute deviation of the trade structure of a country from world structure. The diversification index takes values between 0 and 1. A value closer to 1 indicates greater divergence of export and import from the world pattern. On the contrary closer to 0 indicates no divergence from the world pattern.