An aerial drone photo shows the Qingdao Port in east China's Shandong Province, Feb. 11, 2024. The Qingdao port is busy handling goods for export during the Spring Festival holiday. (Xinhua/Li Ziheng)

China’s foreign trade in goods in the first two months of 2024 hit a record high of 6.61 trillion yuan ($918.3 billion), rising 8.7 percent year-on-year, signaling a good start of foreign trade in the new year, data from the General Administration of Customs showed on Thursday.

The country’s export volume in the two months recorded year-on-year increase of 10.3 percent to reach 3.75 trillion yuan, and imports reached 2.86 trillion yuan, representing annual growth of 6.7 percent.

From January to February, ASEAN remained China’s largest trade partner, with their bilateral trade totaling 993.24 billion yuan, up 8.1 percent on a yearly basis, accounting for 15 percent of China’s total imports and exports.

The EU becomes China’s second largest trade partner, and the total trade between the two sides stood at 832.39 billion yuan, dropping by 1.3 percent. The US was the third largest trade partner, with their trade volume increasing 3.7 percent to 707.7 billion yuan.

In the first two months, China’s foreign trade with its BRI partners reached 3.13 trillion yuan, registering a year-on-year growth of 9 percent. 

The country’s private enterprises had a good performance in the first two month’s import and export. Trade volume of private firms reached 3.61 trillion yuan, an increase of 17.7 percent, accounting for 54.6 percent of the total value of China’s foreign trade, an increase of 4.2 percentage points over the same period last year.

In terms of the export structure, electromechanical products accounted for nearly 60 percent of Chinese exports, of which automatic data processing equipment, integrated circuits and automobile export recorded significant growth rates. 

In the first two months of the year, China's exports of automatic data processing equipment reached 195.45 billion yuan, up 7.3 percent with exports of integrated circuits soaring 28.6 percent and auto vehicle up 15.8 percent on a yearly basis.


Global Times