High-tech exports from Catalonia went up 18% in 2019

Catalan exports of high-tech products went up 18.2% in 2019, reaching a total of 8.7 billion euros, says Catalonia's statistics institute, Idescat.

The rise was above all due to particularly strong sales of pharmaceutical products (up 23.4%) and IT, electronic and optical products (3.8%).  

The increase in high-tech exports to the European Union went up 20.3%, while those outside the EU went up by 16.1%.

As a whole, the export of industrial products accounted for a total of 70 billion euros last year, an increase of 3.2% compared to the previous year.

Yet, while high level tech sales grew 18%, those of middle-high level fell 3.5%, with low level industrial products going up 7.8%, and those of a middle-low level up 6.6%.

Middle-high level tech products accounted for 46% of all industrial exports, and despite the fall last year, reached a total of 31.9 billion euros in sales. 

In this category, material and electronic equipment, machinery and vehicles fell the most (down 5.3%), with 2.1% fewer sales in the EU and 6.5% fewer sales outside the union.

Meanwhile, exports of middle-low level technology products accounted for 10.4 billion euros (up 6.6%), with those of a low level amounting to 18.8 billion euros (up 7.8%).

As for imports of industrial products, they went up 2.9% in 2019, amounting to 83 billion euros, with high-tech products increasing the most (up 11.2%).