Glossary
cabotage
Cabotage is haulage in which a vehicle registered in one country carries goods entirely within another. Eurostat treats it as one of the operation types disaggregating road freight statistics, reported by EU Member States plus Norway and Switzerland under Regulation (EU) No 70/2012, with annual totals from 1999 to 2025.
What is cabotage?
Picture a Polish-registered truck unloading in Rotterdam, then carrying Dutch cargo between Dutch cities before heading home: that domestic leg is cabotage. Eurostat's Road Freight Transport Statistics Explained tags it alongside general transport statistics, splitting aggregates by operation type so cabotage is visible separately from national and international hire-or-reward work.
Reporting is codified: countries deliver under Regulation (EU) No 70/2012, with EU Member States plus Norway and Switzerland in scope, annually and quarterly. Temporal coverage reaches '1999 to 2025 for annual totals (road_go_ta_tott)' with quarterly series also available.
Why does cabotage data matter when choosing a dataset?
Market-access analysis depends on it. Cabotage shares reveal how far foreign carriers penetrate domestic haulage markets - politically sensitive and commercially decisive for national fleets competing against visiting trucks.
Measurement caveats follow the regulation: continuous vs sampled reporting differs across states, so small-country cabotage figures wobble more than large ones. And because the operation-type cut sits inside the road_go dataset family, buyers should confirm any vendor product preserves the cabotage split rather than collapsing operation types into blended totals that erase exactly the competition question being asked.
How do you evaluate cabotage statistics in a source?
- Check the legal basis. Regulation (EU) No 70/2012 defines reporting obligations for EU members plus Norway and Switzerland.
- Confirm the operation-type split survives. Cabotage must remain distinct from national and international carriage in any derived product.
- Mind the temporal window. Annual totals run 1999-2025 (road_go_ta_tott) with quarterly series available.
- Pair with goods classification. NST-2007 categories show what cargo cabotage carriers move, not just volumes.
Related terms
- eurostat-road-go-dataset-family - the dataset family housing the cabotage cut.
- hgv - the vehicle class performing cabotage movements.
- nst-2007-goods-classification - the commodity dimension of road freight tables.
Sector hub: cargo-ground-transportation data.
Frequently asked questions
What does cabotage mean in freight statistics?
Carriage of goods entirely within one country by a vehicle registered in another - reported as a distinct operation type in Eurostat road freight tables.
How far back does Eurostat cabotage data go?
Annual totals cover 1999 to 2025 in the road_go_ta_tott series, with quarterly breakdowns also available under Regulation (EU) No 70/2012.
Datasets containing this field
Datasets containing cabotage
6 datasets carry cabotage in the catalog. Open one, count the fields, judge for yourself.
ATA Economics and Industry Data Hub
Commodity Flow Survey (CFS) 2022
Data.gov Catalog - Casino & Gambling Dataset Search
EU Open Data Portal - Road Freight Transport
identifier · title · description …+8 more
Eurostat Road Freight Transport Statistics Explained
freq · tra_type · tra_oper …+4 more
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