Germany bought about €75 million of Serbian aluminium and aluminium articles in 2025, while Slovenia bought €72 million, making them the largest directly recorded EU markets, EU import figures show. The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) is making verified product-level emissions data increasingly important to suppliers serving those markets.
EU imports of Serbian aluminium and aluminium articles under HS76 totalled $505.7 million, approximately €448 million, in 2025. France bought €64 million, followed by Croatia at €36 million and Romania at €35 million. Alongside alloy, gauge and surface-quality specifications, the trade increasingly requires a verified account of a product’s associated emissions.
Those country figures identify customs-entry markets, not the factories that ultimately incorporated the metal into construction systems, machinery or transport equipment. German and Slovenian processors can aggregate purchases and make components for customers across several EU markets.
Processed products and commercial buyers
EU imports included about €149 million of Serbian aluminium plate, sheet and strip under HS7606 and €79 million of containers under HS7612. Other aluminium articles under HS7616 accounted for about €62 million, while profiles under HS7604 were worth around €41 million. The mix shows trade in processed metal rather than only primary smelting.
Serbian aluminium scrap under HS7602 was also traded, but scrap is not covered by the initial CBAM annex and should be excluded from a precise CBAM trade total.
A Serbian exporter may negotiate with a distributor carrying inventory risk and certificate exposure, while a separate manufacturing customer specifies the alloy and carbon data. For exporters, identifying who sets commercial terms can be as important as identifying the customs destination.
Emissions costs and supplier records
Impol Seval, a major Serbian rolled-aluminium producer, reported about €89.7 million in export receipts in the first six months of 2025. It named Germany, Italy and France among its key markets. Its disclosures indicate industrial export demand and domestic rolling capacity, but do not establish that specific shipments went to vehicles, aircraft or branded consumer packaging; identifying final customers or uses would require contract or supply-chain evidence.
The cost passed on to an EU purchaser of aluminium under current CBAM coverage depends on direct embedded emissions, the production route, precursor inputs and verification. Electricity procurement remains important to plant competitiveness and buyers’ broader sustainability requirements, but indirect electricity emissions should not simply be added to the initial CBAM certificate calculation for aluminium. Suppliers need to distinguish legal emissions reporting from voluntary low-carbon commercial claims.
Serbia’s Ministry of Finance estimated the country’s aluminium CBAM exposure at €19.5 million in 2026 and projected it to remain near that level through much of the projection period. Its estimate holds 2025 exports fixed and uses default emissions values. Actual obligations could differ considerably as transactions, verified factory emissions and EU certificate prices change.
The ministry also modelled possible relief if EU authorities recognise carbon prices paid in Serbia, but that recognition cannot be assumed automatically. Suppliers able to allocate emissions to specific product batches, disclose data consistently across trading entities and demonstrate both physical quality and documentary compliance are better placed to defend access to European manufacturing chains than those relying on a generic low-carbon figure.
Elevated by CBAM.Clarion Engineer
