Estimating the level of UK defence exports on a delivery basis
The report explores new methodologies for estimating the value of UK defence exports on a delivery basis.
Documents
Details
The research was carried out by Cambridge Econometrics on behalf of:
- the Department for International Trade (DIT)
- the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS)
The report:
- uses novel methods to produce experimental estimates of the value of UK defence exports on a delivery basis
- provides recommendations for improving these estimates
There are 2 main methodologies considered in this report.
The OTS (overseas trade statistics) approach
The OTS approach relies on identifying exports of goods that are ‘defence-related’ from HMRC’s trade in goods database.
‘Defence-related’ covers products that are exported for defence and non-defence use.
Assumptions are then developed for each product on the proportion of the defence-related exports that are for defence use.
The Defence and Security Exports (DSE) approach
The DSE approach maps DIT-published defence export orders data (covering both goods and services) to deliveries data published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI Arms Transfer Database).
The 2 approaches produce estimates of UK defence export deliveries in the region of £6 billion to £9 billion in nominal terms in 2017.
Of the 2 approaches, the DSE approach is considered more reliable and comprehensive for estimating defence export deliveries. However, it is not without limitations and areas for further refinement of the estimates are identified in the report.
Estimates for all charts and tables presented in the report are available.
This was published originally by Department for International Trade (DIT) which has since moved to the Department for Business and Trade (DBT).