General

Is there a cliff like decline in foreign trade orders? Here comes the real data! Since 2023, the epidemic situation has rapidly improved, but surprisingly, there have been constant reports of a "cliff like" decline in foreign trade orders. Some industry insiders have stated that foreign trade orders have decreased by about 40%, and major ports such as Shanghai Port, Guangzhou Port, Ningbo Port, and Shenzhen Yantian Port have piled up empty containers. Traditional export manufacturing bases such as the Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta have seen a rapid decline in labor demand and a decrease in hourly wages, Enterprises have gone from being difficult to recruit in previous years to having a surplus of workers now, and some even shouted at the recruitment site, "Those who were 86 years ago can leave now.

The situation in the foreign trade industry is indeed not optimistic, but what does the official real data look like? On March 7th, data released by the General Administration of Customs showed that in the first two months of 2023, the total import and export value of China's foreign trade order goods trade slightly decreased by 0.8% year-on-year, reaching 6.18 trillion yuan, of which exports increased by 0.9% to 3.5 trillion yuan, setting a new historical high for the same period; Imports decreased by 2.9% to 2.68 trillion yuan, and the trade surplus expanded by 16.2% to 810.32 billion yuan.

From the data released by the General Administration of Customs, it can be seen that the overall resilience of the foreign trade situation is strong, with exports achieving positive growth and a stable start overall, continuing to play a supportive role in the economy. The data also reflects that the import and export scale of ASEAN's foreign trade orders reached 951.93 billion yuan, making it China's largest trading partner, with a year-on-year increase of 9.6%, accounting for 15.4% of China's total foreign trade value.

The overall resilience of the foreign trade situation is strong, but it is important to pay attention to the transfer of some foreign enterprises' industrial chains to Southeast Asia, which is indeed a market law of economic development. After all, the labor costs in Southeast Asia and India are much lower than those in China. With the continuous improvement of their infrastructure, these countries will inevitably attract the transfer of labor-intensive industries.

In addition, according to reports, Foxconn plans to invest $700 million to build a new factory in India. Analysis predicts that Apple's iPhone assembly share in India may increase from below 5% to 10-15%. The apple industry chain is crucial for the development of China's technology industry, and the transfer of the apple industry chain still needs to be given sufficient attention.

In 2023, as the Russia-Ukraine conflict continues to worsen, the world economy will face a greater test. As the largest source of China's trade surplus, the U.S. market is crucial to China's foreign trade industry. Every year, China's trade surplus with the United States will be as high as $300 billion to $400 billion. If the Sino US relations continue to deteriorate, the impact on China's foreign trade industry will gradually emerge, and the test of the foreign trade industry will become more and more serious. Of course, we also aim to develop the domestic demand market and expand domestic demand, but the position of the foreign trade industry cannot be replaced. Looking at the example of absolute internal circulation in North Korea, we know the importance of the foreign trade industry