China trade economy File photo: VCG

China's merchandise trade in the first two months of 2024 hit a record high of 6.61 trillion yuan ($918.3 billion), up 8.7 percent year-on-year, the General Administration of Customs (GAC) announced on Thursday, beating forecasts and signaling a good start to the new year. 

Experts said that exports had gained growth momentum, thanks to expanding demand and rising product competitiveness. In the longer term, China's foreign trade will show stable and positive expansion, supporting the GDP growth target of about 5 percent.

Exports in the first two months rose 10.3 percent to 3.75 trillion yuan, and imports were up 6.7 percent to 2.86 trillion yuan.

"Foreign trade saw a better-than-expected performance in the January-February period, mirroring the resilience of the country's economy with expanding domestic and external demand," Tian Yun, an economist based in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday.

ASEAN remained China's largest trading partner, with bilateral trade totaling 993.24 billion yuan, up 8.1 percent year-on-year and accounting for 15 percent of China's total trade.

The EU was China's second-largest trading partner, with bilateral trade of 832.39 billion yuan, down by 1.3 percent. The US was No.3, with trade up 3.7 percent to 707.7 billion yuan.

In the first two months, trade with Belt and Road Initiative partner countries reached 3.13 trillion yuan, up 9 percent. 

Zhou Maohua, an economist from China Everbright Bank, said on Thursday that the record trade figures reflected the recovery of overseas demand, the optimization of the export structure and a boom in new export drivers. 

Electromechanical products accounted for nearly 60 percent of Chinese exports, with automatic data processing equipment, integrated circuits and automobiles showing significant growth, the GAC said.

Exports of automatic data processing equipment reached 195.45 billion yuan, up 7.3 percent, while exports of integrated circuits soared 28.6 percent and those of vehicles increased 15.8 percent.

"The figures mirrored China's continuous industrial upgrading and showed that the competitiveness of its high-tech products and equipment manufacturing industry in the world was increasing," Tian noted.

Conditions were also favorable for trade by private enterprises. Their total trade stood at  3.61 trillion yuan, up 17.7 percent, accounting for 54.6 percent of the total - an increase of 4.2 percentage points from the same period last year.

"Growth in exports led to an increase in domestic production, while the increase in imports reflected strong domestic demand, both of which will help drive the country's GDP growth in the first quarter this year," Wang Peng, an associate research fellow at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Thursday. 

The Government Work Report, delivered by Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Tuesday at the opening meeting of the second session of the 14th National People's Congress, set a GDP growth target of about 5 percent for 2024.

The government vowed to work to steadily increase the volume and raise the quality of foreign trade, with efforts including supporting businesses in diversifying their overseas markets and increasing new growth drivers for foreign trade, including trade in intermediate goods and green trade.

Tian noted that boosted by support policies, foreign trade will maintain moderately positive growth throughout the whole year with an expansion of 3-5 percent. 

"China's foreign trade is expected to hit a record high this year, contributing more to the realization of the country's GDP growth target," Tian said.