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The Netherlands’ agricultural export strength comes from more than what its farms grow. It combines domestic production with food processing, horticulture, imports, and trade infrastructure. In 2025, agricultural exports were estimated at €137.5 billion, but €49.1 billion of that total was re-exports; the remaining €88.4 billion was classified as Dutch-origin, including products substantially processed in the Netherlands from imported ingredients.
What the Netherlands’ agricultural export figures measure
The 2026 report by Wageningen Social & Economic Research and Statistics Netherlands estimated 2025 agricultural exports at €137.5 billion, imports at €95.1 billion, and an agricultural trade surplus of €42.4 billion. These are estimates: figures for the final two months of 2025 were based on early-year developments and late-2024 data. The 2026 report distinguishes gross export value from export earnings and Dutch-origin goods from re-exports.
| 2025 measure | Estimated value | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Agricultural exports | €137.5 billion | Gross value of agricultural goods exported, including Dutch-origin goods and re-exports. |
| Dutch-origin exports | €88.4 billion | Goods classified as originating in the Netherlands, including goods substantially processed there from imported inputs. |
| Re-exports | €49.1 billion | Agricultural goods imported and then exported without being classified as Dutch-origin. |
| Export earnings | €49.1 billion | Estimated earnings associated with agricultural exports: €43.5 billion from Dutch-origin goods and €5.7 billion from re-exports. Components may not sum exactly because of rounding. |
| Agricultural imports | €95.1 billion | Gross value of imported agricultural goods. |
| Agricultural trade surplus | €42.4 billion | Exports minus imports; it is not the same as export earnings or farm income. |
“Dutch-origin” does not mean every ingredient was grown in the Netherlands. Chocolate made in the country from imported cocoa beans can count as Dutch-origin because substantial processing took place there. The report’s definition covers primary and processed agricultural goods; machinery, fertilisers, and other agricultural-related equipment are counted separately.
How imports feed processing and trade
Imports are not simply the opposite of exports in this system. They can supply ingredients for domestic processing, enter products that are later sold abroad, or be exported again. In 2024, around 72% of imported agricultural goods ultimately ended up abroad after being unprocessed, processed, or incorporated into new products. That broad measure does not mean all imports were directly re-exported or used as inputs.
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Cocoa illustrates the processing route: imported beans can be turned into cocoa preparations and chocolate for export. The Dutch-origin classification can capture the value added through processing, while the beans themselves were grown elsewhere. The report also cautions against reading a high export value as a measure of domestic harvest volume.
What the Netherlands exports
The 2025 estimates combine farm products, horticultural goods, and processed foods. Leading export groups included dairy and eggs (€13.3 billion), cocoa and preparations (€12.4 billion), ornamental plants (€12.3 billion), meat (€12.1 billion), fruit (€9.6 billion), and potatoes and vegetables (€9.4 billion). These figures are export values, not quantities produced. In particular, cocoa’s ranking reflected high world-market prices as well as trade in processed products.
Horticulture is a supply chain, not just a set of farms
Wageningen University & Research (WUR) estimated that horticultural exports exceeded €28 billion in 2024, with around 65% made in the Netherlands. Fruit, greenhouse vegetables, and cut flowers were the leading export products. WUR’s measure covers a connected chain that includes technical suppliers, seed and propagation-material cultivation, growers, wholesalers, and processors; the wider horticultural cluster also involves firms such as transport companies, retailers, and suppliers of steel and glass.
WUR put horticultural production value at €33.3 billion in 2024, compared with €26.8 billion in 2020. Its revised method is applied consistently from 2020 onward, so some comparisons with figures from earlier editions are not directly comparable. WUR’s horticulture summary explains the supply-chain scope and methodology.
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Agriculture-related goods that support production are not included in the basic agricultural-goods total. The 2025 report separately estimated €14.0 billion in exports of such goods, led by agricultural machinery (€3.6 billion), greenhouse materials (€3.1 billion), fertilisers (€2.5 billion), and food-industry machinery (€2.3 billion). These figures should not be added to the €137.5 billion agricultural-export estimate without making the scope difference clear.
Where the exports go
The market is primarily European. The EU received 72.9% of Dutch agricultural exports in 2025, and Germany alone accounted for 25%, according to the 2026 report. Those figures show the importance of a nearby customer base; they do not mean all exported goods were grown domestically. In a separate 2024 summary, the Dutch government reported that 72.2% went to the EU, with Germany at 25% and Belgium at 12%. The years differ, so the two sets of shares should not be treated as a like-for-like change.
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Why export value can rise without the same rise in output
Export value reflects both prices and quantities. In 2025, about two-thirds of the increase in agricultural export value came from higher prices and the remainder from volume growth. The 8.4% rise in export value therefore was not an equivalent increase in physical output. Cocoa’s sharp price movements are a clear example of how a product’s trade value can shift even when its exported volume does not move by the same proportion.
This distinction matters when interpreting headlines about record exports. Gross export value describes the value of goods crossing the border; it does not by itself measure farm productivity, domestic production volume, household income, or overall economic welfare.
The economic achievement and its tensions
The Dutch model links producers and processors to imports, wholesalers, logistics, and nearby export markets. WUR researcher Jop Woltjer describes Dutch agriculture as “an important role in international trade chains, as a producer, processor and transit country.” The combination helps explain why the country can export far more in agricultural goods than its land area alone might suggest, without implying that one factor—technology, logistics, geography, policy, or farming practice—accounts for the result by itself.
The system also raises questions about sustainability, land use, and environmental pressure. Woltjer frames the challenge as “how we can continue to benefit from the economic gains of trade while consistently paying attention to societal costs.” The export and trade figures document economic scale; they do not provide a single measure that resolves those environmental and land-use questions or prove a particular sustainability outcome.
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