The growth rate of national foreign trade continued to maintain a positive value in the first quarter of this year.

"For the first time in history, the scale of import and export in the same period exceeded 10 trillion yuan, and the growth rate of import and export set a new high for six quarters," said Wang Lingjun, Deputy Director of the General Administration of Customs, at a press conference held by the State Council Information Office on April 12. In the first quarter of this year, the total value of China's foreign trade in goods was 10.17 trillion yuan, a year-on-year (the same below) increase of 5%. Among them, exports were 5.74 trillion yuan, a growth of 4.9%; imports were 4.43 trillion yuan, a growth of 5%; exports and imports respectively accelerated by 4.1 and 2.3 percentage points compared to the fourth quarter of last year.

To some extent, affected by the long holiday of the Spring Festival, the growth rate of foreign trade in the first quarter this year has declined compared to the first two months, with imports and exports, exports, and imports respectively falling by 3.7, 5.4, and 1.7 percentage points.

From a regional perspective, China's import and export growth rate with countries participating in the "Belt and Road" initiative and other BRICS countries in the first quarter was higher than the overall level. Specifically, the import and export with countries participating in the "Belt and Road" initiative was 4.82 trillion yuan, a growth of 5.5%, accounting for 47.4% of the total import and export value, and increased by 0.2 percentage points year-on-year. Among them, import and export with ASEAN was 1.6 trillion yuan, a growth of 6.4%. At the same time, import and export with the other 9 BRICS countries was 1.49 trillion yuan, a growth of 11.3%, accounting for 14.7%. In addition, import and export with the EU, the United States, South Korea, and Japan were 1.27 trillion, 1.07 trillion, 535.48 billion, and 518.2 billion yuan, respectively, accounting for 33.4% in total.

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According to customs statistics, in the first two months, calculated in US dollars, China's exports to the United States returned to positive growth, increasing by 5% year-on-year, and increased by 11.9 percentage points compared to the previous month. However, the relevant data in the first quarter has declined, with a year-on-year decrease of 1.3% in US dollars and a year-on-year increase of 2.1% in RMB.

Private enterprises continue to lead in import and export, maintaining double-digit growth. In the first quarter, China's private enterprises' import and export was 5.53 trillion yuan, a growth of 10.7%, accounting for 54.3% of the total import and export value, still more than half of the total. At the same time, foreign-invested enterprises' import and export was 2.97 trillion yuan, accounting for 29.3%; state-owned enterprises' import and export was 1.64 trillion yuan, accounting for 16.1%.

From the perspective of product categories, the export performance of mechanical and electrical products and labor-intensive products was good. In the first quarter, China's mechanical and electrical product exports were 3.39 trillion yuan, a growth of 6.8%, accounting for 59.2% of the total export value. Among them, the export of ships continued to surge, with a year-on-year increase of 113.1%, and computers and their parts, automobiles increased by 8.6% and 21.7%, respectively. At the same time, the export of labor-intensive products was 975.72 billion yuan, a growth of 9.1%; among them, the export of textile clothing, plastic products, and furniture and their parts increased by 5.4%, 14%, and 23.5%, respectively.

Wang Lingjun believes that, overall, the foreign trade in the first quarter of China started strongly and had a good momentum, laying a solid foundation for achieving the annual goal of "quality improvement and stable quantity." However, at the same time, the current international environment is undergoing profound changes, and the world economic development is facing many severe challenges, which will bring greater tests to China's foreign trade.

Deputy Minister of Commerce Guo Tingting also said at the press conference on March 26 that the momentum of external demand recovery is still unstable, and many international organizations predict that the global economic growth rate in 2024 will be lower than the historical average. The World Bank predicts that the global trade growth rate will be only half of the average growth rate in the 10 years before the epidemic. Risk factors are also increasing, and geopolitical conflicts, "super election years," and so on, bring more variables. Trade restrictive measures are also increasing, protectionism and unilateralism are escalating, seriously disturbing the stable operation of the global industrial chain and supply chain, and bringing interference and obstacles to foreign trade enterprises to explore the international market.

While facing challenges, Wang Lingjun proposed that it is more important to see that China's economic fundamentals continue to improve, the comprehensive competitive advantage of foreign trade is further consolidated, and the continued improvement of imports and exports has a solid support.In order to better meet challenges, our country will continue to focus on supporting the construction of open platforms, supporting the development of new business forms such as cross-border e-commerce and bonded maintenance, and vigorously carry out innovation in customs supervision systems. With new models of regulatory services, we aim to stimulate new momentum in foreign trade and shape new advantages in this area.