Italy accounted for 17.6% of the European Union’s extra-EU imports in 2025 of products classified under existing Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) codes, making it the bloc’s largest customs destination. The 2025 customs figures put the aggregate import value at 111.23 billion euros; Germany and the Netherlands each represented 12.7%.
Together, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands handled about 43% of the total. Calculations from the rounded shares indicate imports worth roughly 19.6 billion euros for Italy and about 14.1 billion euros each for Germany and the Netherlands; these are indicative estimates, not separate customs extracts.
Spain accounted for 7.8% of the bloc’s import value, Belgium for 6.9%, France for 6.5%, Poland for 6.1% and Romania for 4.2%. The ranking includes products from exempt origins, a relevant qualification for markets that buy substantial quantities of Scandinavian aluminium or electricity.
Customs routes and industrial demand
Italy’s position reflects its metals transformation, machinery, construction-materials and manufacturing ecosystems. Flat steel, steel structures, aluminium profiles and primary metal are priority products for industrial mapping in Italy.
Germany’s industrial demand spans steel processors, automotive manufacturing and mechanical engineering. Automotive steel, advanced manufacturing and aluminium sheet are priority areas for attention there.
The Netherlands’ share partly reflects port entry, storage, trading and the onward movement of goods into the European hinterland. Goods recorded as Dutch imports may be consumed by factories elsewhere in Europe. For the Netherlands and Belgium, a key business question is which import houses, warehouses and distributors supply EU industry.
Belgian customs flows through Antwerp can serve industrial buyers in neighbouring countries. The member state recording a physical import is not necessarily where the authorised CBAM declarant is established, and neither identifies automatically the factory that ultimately uses the material.
Tracing costs through supply chains
Cross-border distribution can obscure the link between the entity on the customs file and the manufacturer absorbing a purchase-price increase. Industrial mapping should start with trade corridors, then trace the material through processors and contracts. The largest customs market may not be the largest final-consumption market.
CBAM-related costs create purchase-price increases and new costs for industrial supply chains, but the figures specify no cost amount. The import ranking alone does not identify which companies or factories will bear those costs.