Profile the people of Belgium: What languages do they speak? What is their average educational level? What is their life expectancy? How fast is the population growing?

Success in international business often depends on a firm obtaining information about foreign markets so that it can make exporting, importing, and investment decisions. Among the most useful sources are the following, all of which are also accessible online:

Survey of Current Business, published monthly by the U.S. Department of Commerce, is a basic source of statistical data on the U.S. economy. It provides detailed analyses of international trade and investment activities affecting the United States.

The World Factbook provides basic geographic, ethnic, religious, political, and economic information on all countries. It is put out by the U.S.

Central Intelligence Agency and is particularly useful because it includes data about small, obscure, and politically controversial areas. For example, if you were an executive for Forum Energy PLC, a British company that was granted rights by the Philippine’s government to hunt for oil and gas around the Spratly Islands, The World Factbook is one of the few sources in which you could learn that the islands, many of which are under water at high tide, have no permanent population yet are claimed and garrisoned by five different countries—China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Armed with this information, you would realize that Forum’s explorations would be extremely sensitive and possibly the target of political conflict.

World Development Report and World Development Indicators, published annually by the World Bank, present numerous tables detailing information about World Bank members, including population, income and income distribution, infrastructure, government expenditures, trade, production, living standards, health, education, and urbanization.

International Trade Statistics Yearbook is an annual United Nations report that provides detailed data on exports and imports, classified by country and by commodity. The report is an excellent source of minutiae—for example, the leading exporters and importers of propane and butane in 2015, 2016, and 2017. However, it is rather clumsy to use when timeseries information is required—for example, Denmark’s total annual exports from 1996 to 2018.

Balance of Payments Statistics, International Financial Statistics, and Direction of Trade Statistics are reports published by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Balance of Payments Statistics, issued annually, contains data about balance of payments performances of IMF members.

The monthly International Financial Statistics offers international and domestic financial data on members’ domestic interest rates, money and banking indicators, prices, exports, and exchange rates. Direction of Trade Statistics details the exports and imports of each IMF member on a quarterly basis.

World Investment Report is produced annually by the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development. It is a primary source of statistics regarding FDI flows and stocks into and from countries. It also provides detailed information about the role of transnational corporations (the United Nations’ preferred term for MNCs) in FDI.

GlobalEdge is a comprehensive web-based source of international business information sponsored by Michigan State University (see globaledge.msu.edu). It provides a wealth of cultural, political, and economic information for over 200 countries and two dozen major industrial sectors. Go to your library or surf the Internet to examine each of these standard references.