In 2020, the EU produced over 2.9 billion litres of ice cream, representing a 9% decline from the previous year.
Over the same period, EU Member States exported 232 million kilograms of ice cream to non-EU countries, worth a total of €752 million. In addition, imports of ice cream from countries outside the EU amounted to 79 million kilograms, worth a total of €182 million. While the quantity of extra-EU ice cream imports declined (-4%) compared with 2019, the exports increased by 5%.
Germany was the EU’s main producer of ice cream
Among the EU Member States, Germany was the main producer of ice cream in 2020, producing 642 million litres of ice cream. Germany was followed by France (2019 data: 516 million litres) and Italy (509 million litres).
As well as being the largest ice cream producer in 2020, Germany produced on average the cheapest ice cream at €1.3 per litre. France reported the highest price at €2.2 per litre of ice cream (2019 data), closely followed by Italy with the average price of €2.0 per litre of ice cream.
Top ice cream exporter: France
France exported 59 million kilograms of ice cream in 2020, accounting for 25% of extra-EU ice cream exports.
This made it the largest ice cream exporter out of all EU Member States, ahead of the Netherlands (which exported 38 million kilograms of ice cream, or 16% of total extra-EU exports), Germany (29 million kilograms, or 13%), Italy (20 million kilograms, or 9%) and Belgium (16 million kilograms, or 7%).
Source: ec.europa.eu