In 2023 and the first half of 2024, international goods trade declined, whereas it had strongly increased over the past thirty years, except for sharp declines during the credit crisis and the COVID-19 crisis. The Netherlands imported and exported more than three times as many goods in 2023 as in 1995. During the same period, the economy grew by nearly three-quarters. This is reported by CBS based on research into international trade since 1917.