Annual data for Automobile/Auto Parts Exports and Imports

Question

A student here is hoping to get data back to 1961 for Canada - United States trade in automobiles and auto parts (North American Industrial
Classification System codes 3361 through 3363). He would like annual data for these.

We can go back to 1980 with the World Trade Database - it uses the Standard International Trade Classification codes: the student is going to try to
identify the codes comparable to the NAICS.

Any ideas on earlier data? If someone had happened to digitize the back issues of Canadian international merchandise trade, (and they all have what the earliest electronic copy does) I think the student's life would be made much easier.

Answer

You may want to have a look at the trade data available through the UNs Comtrade database (http://comtrade.un.org/db/default.aspx). Comtrade has commodity based trade data for a number of reporting countries, including Canada, and some of their data goes back to 1962. The trade data won't be industry based however, it will be commodity based. Some helpful Comtrade user guides are available on the right side of Comtrade's home page (http://comtrade.un.org/db/default.aspx) and on the Basic Query Screen (http://comtrade.un.org/db/dqBasicQuery.aspx).

After checking with the International Trade Division, they stated that: "On a cost-recovery basis, we could produce automobile data by SEG (Summary Export Goods) (1966 to present) but it's not necessarily limited to manufacturing and it could become extremely costly. For your information, here are the SEG codes that cover the automobile industry:
51110 Passenger automobiles and chassis
51120 Trucks, truck tractors and chassis
51131 Other motor vehicles
51132 Motor vehicle engines and parts
51139 Motor vehicle parts, except engines".

They also told me that we started using NAICS in 1992 and that we had SIC (Standard Industrial Classification) prior to that. They mentioned that Industry Canada's Trade Data Online (http://www.ic.gc.ca/sc_mrkti/tdst/engdoc/tr_homep.html) would give you NAICS based data back to 1992 but that it would be difficult for the student to find NAICS data going back further than that.