Uranium: Movement
Why trade data miss the biggest producer
What this tab covers How it flows between countries: the largest bilateral trade routes drawn on a world map, 2024 UN Comtrade export and import values with the top exporters and importers by share, plus shipping routes, chokepoints and trade restrictions.Recorded trade captures little of the real flow. Uranium ores and concentrates (HS 261210) showed only $1.09 billion of exports in 2023: Namibia 71%, Niger 19% and Canada 10%. Kazakhstan, the biggest producer, is missing, probably because yellowcake is often recorded as uranium compounds (HS 2844) or not reported. Imports were just $0.33 billion, 84% to the US and 16% to India. Kazakh uranium moves by rail across Russia to St Petersburg or by the Trans-Caspian route through Azerbaijan and Georgia. Niger's 2023 coup disrupted its French-run mines, and in 2024 the US banned imports of Russian enriched uranium.
Main trade routes, 2023
Chart: World map of the largest trade flows
Exporter (size = share of world exports) Importer (share of world imports) Largest bilateral flows (width = value) Shipping chokepoint UN Comtrade 2023, reported exports by the top four exporters of each traded form to their partners (US$). Bubbles: shares of reported world exports and imports for the main traded form. Hover a line or circle for values.