UNCTAD statistics

02/06/2026

From 2024 to 2025, the euro, the yen and the pound sterling appreciated against the United States dollar respectively at rates of 4%, 1% and 3%. The yuan was stable.

📊Read the insight: https://bit.ly/insight-298
🔢Get the data: http://stats.unctad.org/exchangecrossrates

29/05/2026

Globalization rebounded in 2025 as trade-to-GDP rose again.

But fragmentation is growing: Trade is concentrating in large economies, geographically closer trade links are growing faster, and geopolitics continue to reshape flows.

UNCTAD’s analysis: https://ow.ly/IB4X50Z4WlX

27/05/2026

If you want to learn more about the broader work behind this discussion, explore UN Trade and Development ’s Beyond GDP initiative, advancing new approaches to measuring sustainable and inclusive development.

➡️ https://unctad.org/statistics/beyond-gdp

⏳ Last Call: Beyond GDP – Rethinking How We Measure Progress

Tomorrow’s the day! Join the ISI Academy webinar The Beyond-GDP Debate on:

🗓️ 28 May 2026
⏰ 14:00–15:30 CEST

GDP has long been the world’s go-to measure of economic success — but is it enough to capture well-being, sustainability, and societal progress in today’s world?

🌍 This timely webinar brings together leading experts in economic measurement and official statistics to discuss the growing global movement toward indicators that go beyond economic growth alone.

From climate and inequality to quality of life and social development, discover why the “Beyond GDP” conversation matters now more than ever.

🎙️ Featuring distinguished speakers from the international statistical community - Enrico Giovannini, Anu Peltola and Richard Samans

📢 Final chance to register and join the discussion with our experts!

🔗 Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/2717797955981/WN_vQPeFtwESBSETptwmV9g_w

27/05/2026

𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱 𝗽𝗼𝗽𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗴𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵 𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗵𝗮𝗹𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝘆 𝟮𝟬𝟱𝟬
Globally, the population is growing, but populations was projected to fall in 64 economies in 2025. Since the late 1980s, the pace of population growth has gradually slowed. Although there was a brief rebound after the COVID-19 pandemic, global population growth has since resumed its downward trend.

In 2025, five out of every six people worldwide lived in a developing economy. By 2050, the proportion of people living in what are today classified as developing economies is expected to be six in seven.

Most of this population growth is projected to occur in Africa. Africa’s share of the global population is projected to increase from 19% to 26% by 2050.

𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗱 𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗼𝗺𝗶𝗲𝘀’ 𝗽𝗼𝗽𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗸𝗲𝗲𝗽𝘀 𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗶𝗻𝗴
Globally, 65% of the population were of working age in 2025. Notably, the proportion of children has decreased from 37% in 1975 to 25%, while the proportion of older persons has increased from 5.5% to 10%.

The age structure in developing economies is pyramid-shaped, with each older age group smaller than the preceding younger age group. By contrast, in developed economies, the largest age groups are 35 to 69 years old.

𝗗𝗲𝗽𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆 𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼 𝘀𝗲𝘁 𝘁𝗼 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗶𝗻 𝗔𝗳𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗮 𝗯𝘆 𝟮𝟬𝟱𝟬
In Africa, the decline of the dependency ratio is expected to continue to 2050 and beyond. By then, the indicator is projected to fall to 58% from 74% in 2025. In developed economies, the total dependency ratio is already increasing and is projected to reach 72% by 2050.

🔢 Get the data: http://stats.unctad.org/population
📊 Read the insights: https://bit.ly/insight-123

27/05/2026

On 27 and 28 May 2026, UN Trade and Development participates in the workshop “Unlocking Plastics Data Across the Lifecycle Through the Global Plastics Hub”, organized by UN Environment Programme and the The Nordic Council of Ministers in Oslo, Norway.

UNCTAD will contribute to the expert discussion on “Trade data challenges and opportunities”, highlighting the important role of trade statistics in strengthening plastics lifecycle monitoring and evidence-based policymaking.

UNCTAD plastics trade datasets are a key input to the Global Plastics Hub, the centralized platform mandated by the UN Environment Assembly to support harmonized, verified, and comparable plastics data across the full lifecycle.

🔢 Explore the data: http://stats.unctad.org/plastics
📊 Read the insights: https://bit.ly/insight-117

The workshop brings together national statistical offices, policymakers, researchers, and technical experts to address data gaps, improve global comparability, and strengthen the use of plastics data for national, regional, and global action against plastic pollution.

22/05/2026

Business e-commerce sales have grown rapidly. This trend accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2023), when both businesses and their customers turned to e-commerce to mitigate disruption to other sales channels. It slightly slowed down in 2024, but sales in 2024 were still 4.4% higher than in 2023.

📊Read the insight: https://bit.ly/insight-265
🔢Get the data: http://stats.unctad.org/e-commercetotal

19/05/2026

Setting forth the first global blueprint to move beyond GDP, the United Nations is bringing fresh momentum to measuring progress through a broader set of indicators around well-being, equity and sustainability.

“Let’s count what matters. Let’s embrace these new metrics that complement GDP, and reveal the full picture of the challenges and opportunities our world faces at this extraordinary moment in history.” – Secretary-General António Guterres

Full report: https://ow.ly/Etjr50Z0fy7

18/05/2026

Over the last quarter-century, the role of developing economies in international seaborne trade has increased. While the share of goods loaded onto ships in developing economies has remained between 47% and 51%, the more pronounced trend is that developing economies have increasingly become destinations for heavy goods traded internationally and transported by sea. This can be explained by increased flows of raw materials and industrial inputs into developing economies. Whereas only 27% of the world’s seaborne trade reached developing economies at the beginning of the century, by 2024 this share had risen to 58%.

📊Read the insight: https://bit.ly/insight-244
🔢Get the data: https://bit.ly/data-SeaborneTrade

18/05/2026

Gross domestic product (GDP) has long been the world’s scoreboard for progress. Yet growth can still leave people worse off in security, trust, opportunity and hope.

The United Nations is now proposing a broader dashboard of 31 indicators to capture what GDP tends to miss: well-being, equity, sustainability and resilience.

Read more: https://ow.ly/Ax8Y50Z0foo

15/05/2026

South-South cooperation isn’t just financial. While scholarships are mostly monetary, much support – training, aid, technical expertise – is non-monetized.

These insights come from a joint project where UNCTAD and partners are working to better quantify South–South cooperation for the Sustainable Development Goals.

More data and analysis: https://ow.ly/kv9Z50YZt41