World LNG Report 2021 - LNG Trade

Despite COVID-19 impacts on demand and supply, global LNG trade continued its upward trend in 2020 for another consecutive year of growth, reaching 356.1 MT. The increase in trade, however, was much smaller compared to the growth seen in 2019, at only 1.4 MT versus 40.9 MT. While in 2019, increases in net imports were largely driven by Europe as a result of netbacks, in 2020 increases in net imports were driven mostly by key LNG buyers such as China, India, Chinese Taipei and South Korea, increasing their net imports by a total of 11.7 MT.