General

At a regular press conference of the Ministry of Commerce on the 16th, spokesperson Shu Jueting stated that in the first two months of this year, China's total import and export volume of goods in international trade reached RMB 6.18 trillion, which is basically the same as the same period last year. The foreign trade has started smoothly and demonstrated strong development resilience.

Mainly manifested in the following two aspects:

On the one hand, the scale remains stable. In the first two months, China's foreign trade overcame the challenge of weak external demand, and the total import and export volume of goods remained above 6 trillion yuan, the second highest value in history during the same period. Against the backdrop of a general decline in exports from neighboring countries, China's export decline is controlled in single digits in US dollars, and exports have achieved positive growth in RMB.

On the other hand, the structure is continuously optimized. Private enterprises are more active, with international trade imports and exports increasing by 5.3%, accounting for 51.2%, an increase of 3 percentage points compared to the same period last year. Trade with emerging markets has become closer. Import and export to ASEAN and countries along the "the Belt and Road" have increased by 9.6% and 10.1% respectively. Some high-tech and high-value added products have seen a good growth. The export of international automobile trade has increased by 78.9%.

Shu Jueting stated that this is the result of the domestic economy stabilizing and rebounding, cross-border exchanges becoming smoother, and the accelerated release of new momentum in foreign trade. It is also the result of multiple rounds of policy effects continuing to emerge, and corporate entities overcoming difficulties.

Shu Jueting introduced that local governments and enterprises generally reflect that the weakening of external demand and the decline in orders are the biggest challenges facing the current development of foreign trade, and international trade risks such as poor payment collection in some countries have also increased. On the basis of extensive and in-depth research, the Ministry of Commerce is working with relevant departments to study stable foreign trade policies and promote stable scale and optimized structure of foreign trade in response to local and enterprise needs.

Under the unified deployment of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council, and with the joint efforts of various localities, departments, and foreign trade enterprises, we are confident in maintaining the stable development momentum of foreign trade and making new contributions to consolidating the stable and rebound trend of economic operation