Alabama

Alabama Exports and Foreign Investment

In 2024, Alabama exported $26.8 billion of goods to the world. In 2022, exports from Alabama supported an estimated 90 thousand jobs (latest data available).

Exports from Alabama and Jobs

• Alabama was the 22nd largest state exporter of goods in 2024.
• In 2024, Alabama goods exports were $26.8 billion, an increase of 38 percent ($7.4 billion) from its export level in 2014.
• Goods exports accounted for 9.1 percent of Alabama GDP in 2023 (latest data available).
• Alabama goods exports in 2022 supported an estimated 90 thousand jobs (latest data available). Nationally, jobs supported by goods exports pay up to an estimated 18 percent above the national average.

Manufacturing Exports from Alabama and Jobs

• In 2024, Alabama exported $23.4 billion of manufactured products.
• Alabama exports of manufactured products supported an estimated 78 thousand jobs in 2022 (latest data available).
• The state's largest manufacturing export category is transportation equipment, which accounted for $13.7 billion of Alabama's total goods exports in 2024.
• Other top manufacturing exports are primary metal manufacturing ($2.2 billion), chemicals ($2.1 billion), machinery, except electrical ($1.2 billion), and paper ($984 million).

Exports Sustain Thousands of Alabama Businesses many of which are SMEs

• A total of 4,237 companies exported from Alabama locations in 2022 (latest data available). Of those, 3,374 (80 percent) were small and medium sized enterprises with fewer than 500 employees.
• Small and medium-sized firms generated 17.7 percent of Alabama's total exports of goods in 2022.

Alabama Depends on World Markets

• The state’s largest market was Canada. Alabama exported $4.3 billion in goods to Canada in 2024, representing 16 percent of the state’s total goods exports.
• Canada was followed by Mexico ($4.2 billion), China ($4.1 billion), Germany ($4.1 billion), and Japan ($880 million).
• Alabama’s exports to major world areas included:

 

• 41 percent of Alabama’s goods exports ($10.9 billion) in 2024 went to current FTA partners.  

Agriculture in Alabama depends on Exports

• Alabama is the country’s 31st largest agricultural exporting state, shipping $1.7 billion in domestic agricultural exports abroad in 2022 (latest data available according to the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture).
• Top Agricultural exports were:

	2022 Value	2022 State Rank
broiler meat	$486 million	4
cotton	$364 million	8
other plant products	$221 million	28
soybeans	$110 million	24
other livestock products	$94 million	14

International Investment Creates Jobs in Alabama

• In 2022 (latest data available), foreign-controlled companies employed 132,400 Alabama workers. Major sources of foreign investment in Alabama included Japan, Germany and Canada.
• Foreign investment in Alabama was responsible for 7.7 percent of the state's total private-industry employment in 2022.

Alabama’s Major Metropolitan Areas Benefit from Exporting
In 2023 (latest data available), the following metropolitan areas in Alabama recorded goods exports: Columbus ($911.8 million), Anniston-Oxford ($587.1 million), Auburn-Opelika ($234 million), Birmingham ($2 billion), Daphne-Fairhope-Foley ($1.6 billion), Decatur ($361.8 million), Dothan ($204.4 million), Florence-Muscle Shoals ($195.7 million), Gadsden ($41.2 million), Huntsville ($1.8 billion), Mobile ($2.2 billion), and Montgomery ($996.2 million).

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Estimates of state exports of agricultural products by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture and goods exports by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce are based on different methodologies and are not directly comparable.