Global trade is on track to hit an unprecedented $35trn this year, with East Asia, Africa and South-South corridors driving the gains even as geopolitical fragmentation reshapes supply chains, according to UNCTAD’s year-end global trade update.
Trade is expected to grow 7% in 2025, adding $2.2trn in new value. Crucially, the late-year expansion is being powered by higher volumes, not higher prices, marking a shift from the inflation-driven trade growth seen earlier in the year.
UNCTAD’s data shows goods rising nearly 2% and services 4% in Q3, with momentum slowing but still positive into Q4. Trade inflation is set to fall, with prices for traded goods expected to decline in the final quarter.
East Asia remains the standout performer, posting 9% export growth over the past year, underpinned by a 10% surge in intra-regional trade. Africa also recorded strong momentum, with imports up 10% and exports up 6%. South-South flows grew around 8%, underscoring how trade between developing economies has become a structural engine of global commerce.
Manufacturing remains the backbone of global trade growth, led by electronics, which expanded 14% on the back of AI-driven demand. Agriculture also saw a sharp Q3 rebound, while energy and automotive shipments faltered: crude oil flows fell, LNG contracted, and global automotive trade shrank 4% over the year.
Yet the backdrop is far from calm. UNCTAD warned that friendshoring and nearshoring intensified again in 2025, accelerating the restructuring of trade routes already underway since the pandemic era. Trade imbalances remain elevated, and supply chains are consolidating around politically aligned partners.
Looking ahead, the agency expects weaker growth in 2026 as slowing global activity, rising debt burdens, higher logistics costs and persistent uncertainty weigh on performance.
For shipping, the numbers confirm what operators have felt all year: global trade hasn’t just recovered – it has rerouted. East Asia and Africa’s rising share, the resurgence of volumes in emerging markets, and steadily climbing South-South flows are redrawing the commercial map of global shipping as the industry enters 2026.
Splash reported yesterday on China’s trade surplus smashing through the $1trn mark in the first 11 months of 2025 – a record that underscores how dramatically global container flows have shifted this year, even as trade with the US slumps nearly 29%.
China-US liftings have been in structural decline throughout 2025, weighed down by Trump’s protectionism, near-shoring, inventory corrections, and a wave of trade-diversion strategies among American importers. Yet the shortfall has been more than offset by booming demand from Latin America, the Middle East, Russia-adjacent markets, and parts of Africa and South Asia.
“Traditional trade patterns are being rewritten as China redirects exports from tariff-impacted US markets toward Europe (+10-15%), Africa (+20-25%), and intra-Asian lanes (+6-8%), while emerging markets-led by India, Philippines, and East Africa-accelerate their rise,” noted a new report from Vizion, an American container tracking platform.
Faced with US tariff barriers, Chinese exporters executed what Vizion described as “a remarkable geographic pivot” in 2025. Vizion data shows US-bound bookings from China are down 8-12% this year compared to 2024, while Europe-bound bookings are up by 10-15%, Africa-bound bookings are up a remarkable 20-25%, while ASEAN-bound bookings are up 6-8%.
Writing for Splash earlier this year, Neil Shearing, group chief economist at Capital Economics, and author of this year’s bestseller The Fractured Age, suggested that globalisation is not ending, but patterns of global trade are being redrawn.
“Identifying where the faultlines of this fracturing will lie – and therefore which industries and shipping routes will be most affected – will be critical,” Shearing wrote, adding: “My base case is that it will be contained primarily to strategically important sectors – think phones, batteries, chips, pharmaceuticals and dual-purpose goods like drones. What’s more, I suspect that where manufacturing is relocated out of China it will shift to another low-cost country. Accordingly, the overall effect may be more, not less, shipping demand – especially if new routes lengthen voyage times.”
