These sections are: chemicals and related products, manufactured goods classified chiefly by material, machinery and transport equipment and miscellaneous manufactured articles.

The economic and geographic groupings in accordance with those of the international merchandise trade, table 34 in this issue, although table 34 includes more detailed geographic sub-groups which make up the groupings ‘Other developed economies’ and ‘Developing economies’ of this table.

In 2000 the exports of manufactured goods by all ‘Developed’ and ‘Developing economies’ accounted for approximately 97 per cent of world exports of manufactured goods

The unit value indices are obtained from national sources.

For countries that do not compile indices for manufactured goods export conforming to the above definition, sub-indices are aggregated to approximate an index of SITC sections 5-8.

Unit value indices obtained from national indices are rebased, where necessary, so that 2000=100. Indices in national currency are converted into U.S. dollars using conversion factors obtained by dividing the current weighted average exchange rate by the weighted average exchange rate in the base period. All aggregate unit value indices are current period weighted.

The indices in SDRs are calculated by multiplying the equivalent aggregate indices in U.S. dollars by conversion factors obtained by dividing the SDR/$US exchange rate in current period by the rate in the base period.