Objective

Honey Trade Minder (HTM) aims to provide a comprehensive tool for navigating and understanding international honey trade flows. The analysis is structured around two main aspects:

• Volume: Analysis of direct and indirect import flows.
• Price: Evolution of honey pricing over time.

Note: In this first version of HTM, the focus is on the European region.

Data Sources

The data is sourced exclusively from official databases:

• Eurostat Comext: Detailed data on import and export flows between countries (HS Code: 040900 - Honey).
• FAOSTAT: FAO database providing statistics on the production and trade of agricultural products (FAO Code: 1182 - Natural honey).

Volume Analysis

The Volumes tab allows users to explore the production, import, and export volumes for each country and year. The data is presented in four charts:

• Commercial Balance: Displays production, imports, and exports for the selected country.
• Direct Imports - Purchased From: Declared imports from partner countries to the reporting country.
• Indirect Imports - Produced From: An estimate of the product's initial source, derived using a custom processing algorithm based on a "dilution method." This method assumes that all honey imported by a country is a uniform blend of its domestic production and imports. See the methodology section for details.
• Exports: Volume exported by the selected country to its trading partners, based on official data.

Pricing Analysis

The Pricing tab displays the import and export prices for partner countries over the years. To enhance clarity, yearly import and export values are averaged into a single price series, displayed on a unified chart.

Methodology

Calculation of Direct Imports

The direct proportion represents the share of direct imports from a partner country relative to a reporting country's total resources.

Formula:

Direct proportion_ij = Flow_ij / Total resources_i

Where:

• Flow_ij is the flow (quantity or value) from a partner country j to a reporting country i.
• Total resources_i = Production_i + Σ Flow_j,i for the reporting country i.

Calculation of Indirect Imports

Introducing the Total-Blending-Method Hypothesis

The Total Blending Method assumes that a country's exports are a uniform mixture of its domestic production and imports. These imports, in turn, are blended resources originating from other partner countries, following a recursive process.

Disclaimer: The assumption of uniform blending simplifies trade dynamics. In reality, trade involves various honey qualities that vary over time and between partners. While actual flows are complex and technically challenging —if not impossible— to compute, the total blending method offers an "averaged" approach, providing a reasonable estimate of trade dynamics, allowing a deeper analysis beyond the classical direct flows.

Why is it Important?

The Eurozone receives the majority of its honey imports through five key ports: Hamburg (DE), Antwerp (BE), Valencia (ES), Rotterdam (NL) and Porto (PT). From these entry points, the honey is then distributed across Europe. Tracking the original source of these imports is crucial to understanding trade dynamics.

Formula:

Indirect proportion_t+1[i, j] = Σ_k=1^N Indirect proportion_t[k, j] · (Flow_k,i / Total resources_i)

This is an iterative system that recalculates proportions based on resource distribution until convergence.

Illustration with an Example

Let's take a simple example to explain how the total blending method works. Consider three countries, A, B, and C, trading exclusively among themselves. The trade flows and quantities are as follows:

Therefore the Direct Imports trade can be summarized in the next table

TO\FROM	A	B	C
A	x	-	-
B	10	x	30
C	-	10	x

Results After Applying the Blending Method:

TO\FROM	A	B	C
A	x	-	-
B	11.8	x	28.2
C	14.7	-	x

• Country B imports from A and C, then exports to C.
• The exports from B to C include a dilution of the imports from A (Flux AB) and C (Flux CB).
• Similarly, C's resources include a dilution of imports from A (via B) and C's own production.

Histogram Display

Results are presented in four histograms for a selected country and year:

• Remark 1: Only the top 14 countries are shown for better visualization (ranked by volume).
• Remark 2: Indirect imports depend on local production data from FAOSTAT. If this data is unavailable, indirect flows cannot be calculated and are not displayed.

Price Analysis

The average price per kilogram is calculated for each reporting country and year:

• Average Import Price: Import price_t = Total import value_t / Total import quantity_t
• Average Export Price: Export price_t = Total export value_t / Total export quantity_t

Where:

• t represents a given year.
• Values are expressed in euros, and quantities in kilograms.

Line Chart Display

The price data is displayed in three line charts for a selected country:

• Remark 1: Countries with yearly import volumes below 500 kg are excluded.
• Remark 2: Only the top 14 countries are displayed for better visualization (ranked by price per kg).