La staffetta vincente tra i settori industriali guida la leadership dell’export italiano nel mondo.

The winning relay between industrial sectors drives the leadership of Italian exports in the world.

In the trade surplus with foreign countries, "new" products now weigh more than "traditional" ones.

by Marco Fortis

The world has changed a lot in the last twenty years and today sees the old international order as "defunct", to use the words of Mario Draghi. But Made in Italy has changed perhaps even more than the surrounding universe itself and has been able to adapt to continuous external shocks, continuously evolving. In fact, our foreign trade is no longer the same as it was at the beginning of the century, it has developed new specializations, has expanded the geography of its exports and has surprised most observers who believed it was headed towards a possible decline. Nothing could be more wrong, because Made in Italy has never been as strong as it is today, despite the crises in some of its main markets,first of allGermany, which are slowing down exports, and despite the sword of Damocles of recent US tariffs.

Whoever is used to thinking of Made in Italy essentially as a body of sectors focused on textiles-clothing-leather goods-footwear and home furnishings, would be surprised to note how these sectors, although still important and distinctive of our international image, now play a lesser role in Italy's foreign trade surplus. Surplus which is today generated not only by these traditional sectors but also by the mechanics of machines and appliances, which has grown strongly in the last three decades, and above all by a mix of sectors and products that have recently taken on a leading and even now dominant role in Italy's foreign manufacturing assets. So let's go and discover this "new" Made in Italy.

The “new” Made in Italy

The "new" Made in Italy consists of: pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, glasses, food and drinks, shipbuilding. The weight of the main products of these sectors in Italy's foreign trade surplus is now higher not only than that of the main textile-clothing-leather-footwear and home furnishings products but also than that of the main mechanical products. Today we will present a preview of the results of a study that demonstrates in a plastic way the contours of this exceptional change/expansion of Italy's international specialization, which is difficult to trace to a similar extent in the experience of other advanced economies.

We chose, based on the dataUN-International Trade Centreand to the international product classification HS4, the fifteen most important products in terms of Italian foreign surplus in three macro-sectors, taking as the reference year2024:

1) “traditional” Made in Italy(which we will call MIT, composed of: textiles-clothing-leather goods-footwear, furniture, lamps and lighting technology, ceramic tiles and ornamental stones);

2) Mechanics(which we will call MEC, i.e. non-electrical machines and appliances, such as packaging machines, machine tools, taps, pumps, commercial refrigeration, etc.);

3) the “new” Made in Italy(which we will call NMI, composed of: packaged pharmaceutical products, perfumes, make-up and hair care products, sunglasses, food, still and sparkling wines, yachts and cruise ships).

Overall, the forty-five products considered here of the 3 aforementioned macro-sectors alone generated a foreign trade surplus for our country of 145 billion dollars in 2024.

The first fifteen MIT products are illustrated intable 1. Overall, in 2024 their foreign trade surplus was 38 billion dollars, the second highest surplus in the world for this product group after that of China, equal to210 billionof dollars, as appears fromtable 2. Compared to 30-40 years ago, Italy is no longer the leading country in world trade in this category of goods because since the 1990s it has progressively ceded the segments with lower added value to the Asian giant and other emerging countries (Viet Nam, Bangladesh, India), focusing on luxury and higher quality products. When China entered the WTO at the beginning of the millennium, many predicted an unstoppable decline for Italian foreign trade, which instead not only managed to maintain an important role in "traditional" products, maintaining market shares in the high range of these products, but was able to diversify in the MEC and in the NMI, as we will see below. In MIT, Italy remains the world's leading exporter of some goods such as footwear with leather uppers, ceramic tiles, tanned bovine hides, leather clothing, combed wool fabrics.

The first fifteen MEC products are illustrated intable 3. In 2024, Italy presented an overall foreign surplus for these fifteen products equal to45 billionof dollars. In most of these goods, Italy is always among the top 2-4 in the world for foreign assets. It competes mainly with China, Germany and Japan, as can be seen from thetable 4.

And now we come to the first fifteen products of the NMI, listed intable 5.Their foreign surplus in 2024 was well62 billionof dollars, higher than that of the first fifteen MIT and MEC products. Italy is now practically the undisputed dominator in this mix of NMI goods, followed at a considerable distance by Germany and France, as appears from thetable 6.In numerous NMI goods, Italy is the first world exporter (pasta, yachts, tomato processing products), the second (wines and sparkling wines, glasses, cheeses, sauces, hair care preparations) or the third (packaged medicines, bakery products). In reality, within the 4-digit entries of the HS classification there are further "hidden" first places for Italy in the NMI visible only at the HS6 level: for example, Italy holds the highest foreign surplus for cruise ships and sunglasses.

The irresistible rise of the "new" Made in Italy

To get an idea of how the "new" Made in Italy has established itself as the main pillar of Italy's foreign trade surplus, see thetables 7 and 8. Twenty years ago, in 2004, the first 15 MIT products considered here were in the lead in Italian assets abroad with26.8 billionof dollars and preceded the assets of the first 15 MECs, equal to26.7 billion, with the top 15 NMI furthest behind in third place with11.6 billion.

In 2014 the first 15 MEC products had clearly jumped to first place, with a surplus of 43.5 billion, ahead of the 15 MIT, with33.5 billion, while the 15 NMI were growing but remained third, with28.9 billion.

Finally, in 2024 we find the 15 NMI in the lead, which becomes the aggregate with the most significant foreign surplus, equal to62 billion dollars, in front of the 15 MEC, with44.9 billion, and at the 15 MITs, with38 billion.

Given 100 the total of the overall foreign trade surplus of the 45 products analyzed here, in 2004 the 15 main NMI products weighed only17.8%. Their weight then rose to27.3%in 2014, to finally surge to42.8%in 2024.

From 2014 to 2024 the assets of the fifteen main NMI products grew significantly33.1 billionof dollars,13.9 billionmore of which coming from packaged drugs,10.6 billionmore from food,3.2 billionmore from yachts and cruise ships,2.8 billionmore from cosmetics,1.8 billionmore from the wines. In percentage terms, the most significant increases were those of cheeses, whose surplus increased almost sixfold in ten years (+564%), various food preparations (+402%), sauces and condiments (+215%), perfumes (+199%), packaged drugs (+194%), cosmetic products for skin care and make-up (+186%) and bakery products (+184%).

In the first nine months of 2025, according to provisional data, the foreign trade surplus of the 15 main products of the NMI further rose to60.8 billionof dollars, a figure almost close to the amount for the entire year 2024, with a strong increase of14.5 billionof dollars compared to the first nine months of 2024. This growth was driven above all by packaged medicines (+10.5 billion), with important contributions however also from cruise ships, cheeses and cosmetics. In the same period, the assets of the 15 main MIT products fell by892 millionof dollars and that of the 15 main MEC products grew by1.2 billionof dollars.

As a consequence, again in the first nine months, the weight of the first 15 products of the NMI on the total surplus of the 45 excellent goods examined here rose from43.3%of the same period of 2024 to50%. The share of the 15 MIT products has fallen since26.5%al22.5%and that of the 15 MEC products has fallen from30.2%al27.5%(always see tables 7 and 8). In other words, the weight of the "new" Made in Italy on the total surplus of the 45 excellent products of our international trade has more than doubled from 2004 to today.