Sharing land borders with Mexico, Belize, Honduras and El Salvador, Guatemala is the most highly populated Central American country. As the country’s top exported products suggest, Guatemala is largely an agricultural economy.
Knitted clothing, lead, precious metal ores and packaged medicines were also among the 20 highest-value Guatemalan export products.
The following list shows on which products Guatemalan exporters earned the most revenue. Unlike most information currently available on the web, the items below are detailed at the 4-digit tariff code level. These items can help entrepreneurs identify more precisely which products in which the Guatemala has strong competitive advantages compared with other nations — and therefore opportunities for trade partnerships.
For more recent trade data, please see Guatemala’s Top 10 Exports.
Most Valuable Guatemalan Export Products
Below are the 20 most valuable export products sold by Guatemalan exporters in 2017.
- Bananas, plantains: US$882.3 million (up 4% since 2016)
- Sugar (cane or beet): $826.2 million (up 0.5%)
- Coffee: $748.6 million (up 15%)
- Palm oil: $446.5 million (up 18.2%)
- Nutmeg: $367 million (up 59.5%)
- Women’s blouses, shirts (knit or crochet): $313.7 million (down -19%)
- Men’s shirts (knit or crochet): $242 million (down -4.9%)
- Jerseys, pullovers (knit or crochet): $221.9 million (up 97.8%)
- Medication mixes in dosage: $217.1 million (down -28.5%)
- Melons, watermelons, papayas: $193.5 million (down -15.7%)
- Women’s clothing (not knit or crochet): $178.2 million (up 7.4%)
- Natural rubber: $176.1 million (up 46.1%)
- Packaged insecticides/fungicides/herbicides: $167.1 million (down -1.9%)
- Lead ores, concentrates: $148.5 million (down -54.2%)
- T-shirts, vests (knit or crochet): $140.6 million (up 28.9%)
- Paper containers, cellulose wadding: $140.1 million (up 5.3%)
- Non-alcoholic drinks (not water/juice/milk): $136.5 million (up 3.6%)
- Leguminous vegetables: $126.4 million (up 24.3%)
- Bread, biscuits, cakes, pastries: $125.8 million (up 6.1%)
- Iron ferroalloys: $120.6 million (up 39.1%)
Among the most valuable products, Guatemala’s international sales of knitted or crocheted jerseys and pullovers posted the greatest increase in the value via a 97.8% gain from 2016 to 2017.
In second place was exported nutmeg which improved 59.5% year over year.
Guatemalan shipments of natural rubber realized a 46.1% improvement, ahead of the 39.1% increase for exported iron ferroalloys.
Leading the decliners were medication mixes in dosage shipped from Guatemala, dropping -54.2%.
From 2016 to 2017, the average change for all Guatemalan exports was a 4% uptick in value.
See also Guatemala’s Top 10 Exports and Guatemala’s Top Trading Partners
Research Sources:
International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook Database (GDP based on Purchasing Power Parity). Accessed on June 4, 2018
The World Factbook, Field Listing: Exports and World Population, Central Intelligence Agency. Accessed on June 4, 2018
Trade Map, International Trade Centre, www.intracen.org/marketanalysis. Accessed on June 4, 2018