Comoros Import Trade Data: $273.14M in 2023, Up 19.5%

The UAE Supplies More Than a Quarter of Comoros' Imports

Comoros imported $273.14 million worth of goods in 2023, up 19.5% from $228.67 million the year before. The United Arab Emirates supplied 27.6% of that total, worth $75.37 million, by far the largest single source. Trade analysis of the region notes that the UAE's Dubai World Africa investment arm is focused on the African continent and the Indian Ocean Islands, with roughly 30 investment projects across Djibouti, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Comoros specifically, part of a broader push by Dubai to position itself as the trading and logistics gateway for African and Indian Ocean markets. That strategy leans on the emirate's status as a free port with minimal tariffs and extensive shipping and air-cargo connections, advantages that let Dubai-based traders consolidate goods from manufacturers around the world and route them onward to smaller, harder-to-reach markets like Comoros far more efficiently than most individual suppliers could manage on their own.

India ranked second at 10.3% ($28.07 million), and France followed at 9.8% ($26.82 million), a continuation of trade ties dating back to the colonial era, when the archipelago was administered as a French territory until independence in 1975. Together, the UAE, India, and France, the top three suppliers, account for 47.7% of total import value. China added 9.5% ($25.97 million), Pakistan a nearly identical 9.4% ($25.68 million), Turkey 4.9% ($13.42 million), Vietnam 3.4% ($9.37 million), Poland 3.3% ($9.08 million), Tanzania 2.6% ($7.15 million), and Mauritius rounded out the top ten at 2.1% ($5.67 million).

Rice, Fuel, and Vehicles Lead What Comoros Buys

Cereals led all import categories in 2023, worth $39.30 million and accounting for 14.4% of total value, driven largely by rice, the country's preferred staple food. World Bank analysis of Comoros' rice market notes that private operators imported roughly 12,000 tons of rice over just a six-month stretch, representing about 40% of the country's annual demand, implying total yearly rice needs of somewhere around 30,000 tons, most of which has to come from abroad given how limited domestic production is, a gap that has made rice prices and import policy a recurring point of political and economic debate on the islands. Mineral fuels ranked second at 10.2% ($27.94 million), unsurprising for an archipelago with no oil or gas production of its own, and vehicles added 8.9% ($24.27 million), a category that fits neatly with the UAE's role as both top supplier and a well-known regional hub for exporting cars to African and Indian Ocean markets.

Meat and edible offal contributed 8.2% ($22.51 million), and salt, sulphur, stone, and cement materials added 7.3% ($19.80 million), reflecting ongoing construction activity across the islands. Iron and steel contributed 4.6% ($12.68 million), products of the milling industry, largely wheat flour, 3.6% ($9.90 million), electrical machinery 3.5% ($9.52 million), dairy produce 3.5% ($9.46 million), and machinery and mechanical appliances rounded out the top ten at 2.9% ($8.06 million). Food staples alone, cereals, meat, milled products, and dairy combined, make up close to a third of everything Comoros imports, underscoring just how much of the archipelago's food supply has to travel by ship before it ever reaches a dinner table.

A Volatile Import Bill Tied to a Small Economy

Comoros' import total has swung sharply over the past five years. It stood at $203.59 million in 2019, rose to $229.59 million in 2020 despite the pandemic, jumped to a five-year high of $326.49 million in 2021, eased back to $228.67 million in 2022, and climbed 19.5% to $273.14 million in 2023, extending a pattern of large year-to-year swings rather than settling into any steady trend.

Set against the $28.53 million Comoros exported in 2023, this import total leaves the archipelago with a trade deficit of roughly $244.61 million, a gap nearly ten times the size of the country's entire export base and a clear illustration of how heavily this small island economy depends on the rest of the world for food, fuel, vehicles, and construction materials it cannot produce at home. That gap has to be covered through some combination of remittances from Comorians living abroad, foreign aid, and external borrowing, since export earnings from cloves, vanilla, and ylang-ylang come nowhere close to covering the country's import bill on their own. For a closer look at how individual partner countries or product categories break down year over year, the data panels above provide the full detail behind these figures.