The 2011 Import and Export Market for Beverages and Tobacco in Malawi

On the demand side, exporters and strategic planners focusing on beverages and tobacco in Malawi face a number of questions. Which countries are supplying beverages and tobacco to Malawi? How important is Malawi compared to others in terms of the entire global and regional market? How much do the imports of beverages and tobacco vary from one country of origin to another in Malawi? On the supply side, Malawi also exports beverages and tobacco. Which countries receive the most exports from Malawi? How are these exports concentrated across buyers? What is the value of these exports and which countries are the largest buyers?

This report was created for strategic planners, international marketing executives and import/export managers who are concerned with the market for beverages and tobacco in Malawi. With the globalization of this market, managers can no longer be contented with a local view. Nor can managers be contented with out-of-date statistics which appear several years after the fact. I have developed a methodology, based on macroeconomic and trade models, to estimate the market for beverages and tobacco for those countries serving Malawi via exports, or supplying from Malawi via imports. It does so for the current year based on a variety of key historical indicators and econometric models.

In what follows, Chapter 2 begins by summarizing where Malawi fits into the world market for imported and exported beverages and tobacco. The total level of imports and exports on a worldwide basis, and those for Malawi in particular, is estimated using a model which aggregates across over 150 key country markets and projects these to the current year. From there, each country represents a percent of the world market. This market is served from a number of competitive countries of origin. Based on both demand- and supply-side dynamics, market shares by country of origin are then calculated across each country market destination.