Product-Level AI-Derived Indicators Database for International Trade
Empirical research in international trade increasingly relies on product-level panel data. Granular bilateral trade flows at the HS 6-digit level are now available for most countries and years, but the indicators used to characterize traded products have not kept pace. The World Customs Organization revises the Harmonized System on a roughly five-year cycle, releasing trade data in successive vintages. Yet classical measures such as product differentiation indices (Rauch 1999) and intermediate/final/capital goods classifications (UN BEC) were defined for older nomenclatures and have never been systematically updated. Applying them to modern HS-based data requires concordance tables that introduce noise, reduce coverage, and operate at coarser aggregation levels—a cost that compounds across revisions. Other economically relevant attributes, such as perishability, hazardousness, semiconductor content, and conflict-mineral exposure, have never been classified at the HS 6-digit level at all.
PLAID addresses this gap with a replicable pipeline in which large language models classify products at scale, using an ensemble of four frontier LLMs with majority-vote aggregation and transparent uncertainty measures. Because the method operates directly on HS product descriptions, it eliminates the need for concordance tables and yields internally consistent classifications across all HS revisions since 1992.
Six dimensions of product classification
Classifies goods by price-formation institutions into organized-exchange (w), reference-priced (r), or differentiated (n). Exchange goods have standardized contracts on major commodity exchanges with public prices. Reference-priced goods have widely published benchmark prices. Differentiated goods depend on brand, design, and specifications.
Replicates the SNA end-use dimension of the UN BEC framework. Capital goods are used in production over multiple periods. Intermediate inputs are consumed in production processes. Consumption goods are purchased by households for direct use.
Measures how quickly goods lose economic value over time on a five-class scale. Ultra-perishable products (class 1) lose value within days; non-perishable products (class 5) retain value for decades. Captures physical spoilage, regulatory expiry, seasonal obsolescence, and technological obsolescence.
Boolean flag for products classified under the Globally Harmonized System (GHS) of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals, or subject to dangerous-goods transport regulations such as the IMDG Code (maritime) and IATA Dangerous Goods Regulations (air). Covers explosives, flammable materials, toxic substances, corrosives, radioactive materials, and oxidizers.
Whether the product contains, embeds, or is a semiconductor as a functional component. Covers integrated circuits, finished electronics, vehicles with ECUs, medical devices with microcontrollers, and industrial machinery with PLCs.
Whether the product contains tin, tantalum, tungsten, or gold. Regulated under EU Regulation 2017/821 and US Dodd-Frank Section 1502. Identifies the specific mineral type.
PLAID is designed to grow. If you need a product-level attribute that is not yet covered, let us know and we will consider it for a future release.
Search and browse HS6 product classifications
| Code | Description | Rauch | BEC | Perish. | Hazard. | Micro. | 3TG |
|---|
PLAID v0.1 beta database — 42 files, CC BY 4.0
PLAID data is available as a static JSON API. Each product has its own endpoint containing consensus classifications and per-model reasoning.
Product detail:
curl https://plaid.julianhinz.com/api/v0.1/H6/010121.jsonFull product index (all products for a revision):
curl https://plaid.julianhinz.com/api/v0.1/H6/index.json{
"code": "010121",
"revision": "H6",
"description": "Horses; live, pure-bred breeding animals",
"indicators": {
"rauch": {
"consensus": { "value": "n", "shares": { "w": 0, "r": 0, "n": 1 } },
"models": {
"Mistral": { "value": "n", "confidence": 0.92, "reasoning": "..." }
}
}
}
}Also available at trade.ifw-kiel.de/PLAID. Replication code at github.com/julianhinz/PLAID.
Each HS6 product is independently classified by four large language models via the OpenRouter API. The prompt includes the product's HS6 code, full description, and chapter-level context from the official HS nomenclature. The structured prompt ensures each model receives identical information, producing classifications that are comparable across models.
Multi-model ensemble. To reduce model-specific bias and provide uncertainty quantification, each product is independently classified by four frontier LLMs. The final classification is the majority vote across models. Per-category shares and standard deviations quantify model agreement, providing natural uncertainty measures. Products where models disagree can be flagged for manual review or further investigation.
Product descriptions are sourced from the UN STATS HS nomenclature.
Help us improve PLAID
PLAID is a beta release and we welcome feedback from the research community. If you notice a misclassification, have suggestions for new indicators, or want to report an issue, please get in touch.
Send feedback to tradepolicy@kielinstitut.de
You can also suggest corrections for individual products using the "Suggest a correction" button on each product detail page.