42 trillion yuan Last year, China's foreign trade achieved a new breakthrough

Reporter Han Songyan

On January 13, the General Administration of Customs released foreign trade import and export data for the whole year of 2022, showing that in 2022, the total value of China's import and export of goods trade was 42.
07 trillion yuan, an increase of 7.
7%
over 2021.
Among them, exports were 23.
97 trillion yuan, an increase of 10.
5%; Imports were 18.
1 trillion yuan, an increase of 4.
3%.

Lu Daliang, spokesman of the General Administration of Customs, said at the press conference of the State Council's new office held on the same day that China's foreign trade has achieved new breakthroughs in 2022, and the scale, quality and efficiency of imports and exports have been simultaneously improved
.

Import and export are resilient and large-scale

"In 2022, China's foreign trade imports and exports overcame the challenge of multiple factors exceeding expectations, achieved stable growth on the basis of the high base of the previous year, and exceeded the 40 trillion yuan mark for the first time, making positive contributions
to the steady development of the economy.
" Lv Daliang said that since last year, the state has introduced a package of policies and follow-up measures to stabilize the economy, customs has efficiently coordinated the prevention and control of epidemics at ports and promoted the steady growth of foreign trade, focused on promoting the implementation of a package of policies and successor measures to stabilize the economy, and made every effort to promote the stability and quality
of foreign trade.

In terms of promoting the implementation of policies and measures, a series of policies and measures to stabilize foreign trade have been further promoted in the implementation of customs in detail, and the General Administration of Customs has successively issued 10 measures to promote the stability and quality of foreign trade, 6 measures to help small and medium-sized enterprises and 7 measures
to help enterprises bail out and reduce costs.
In terms of stabilizing the main body of foreign trade, we insist on helping enterprises benefit enterprises, improve the long-term mechanism of service enterprises, and help foreign trade enterprises grasp orders, expand markets, and solve problems
.
In terms of continuously optimizing the business environment at ports, a special action to promote cross-border trade facilitation has been carried out, and ten facilitation measures have been launched in conjunction with relevant national departments to deepen the construction of a "single window" for international trade and consolidate the effectiveness of
reducing the overall customs clearance time.
In terms of cultivating new momentum of foreign trade, we will continue to increase the publicity and guidance of relevant policies and measures of cross-border e-commerce, promote the B2B export supervision model of cross-border e-commerce retail import return center warehouse, introduce measures to support enterprises to set up export overseas warehouses, and continuously improve the quality and level
of cross-border e-commerce development.

Lv Daliang introduced that the main driving factors for the current growth of foreign trade are as follows: First, there is a market for exports, and the main products have sufficient competitive advantages
.
From the perspective of the market, China's exports to major trading partners such as ASEAN and the EU will maintain rapid growth in 2022; Emerging markets accelerated their development, with exports to countries along the "Belt and Road" increasing by 20%, driving overall exports growth by 6.
1 percentage points, and exports to Africa and Latin America increasing by 14.
8% and 14.
1%
respectively.
From the perspective of products, China's exports of industrial products will increase by 9.
9% in 2022, driving the overall export growth by 9.
4 percentage points
.
According to the latest data, the current international market share of China's exports is 14.
7%, ranking first
in the world for 14 consecutive years.
Second, imports are supported, and domestic demand has great
potential.
In 2022, China will coordinate the overall situation at home and abroad, coordinate epidemic prevention and control and economic and social development, coordinate development and security, and develop steadily economically, and major economic indicators such as industrial added value above designated size and fixed asset investment in the country will maintain growth, providing strong support
for import growth.
Third, there is policy support, and the endogenous driving force of foreign trade development is strong
.
In 2022, the state introduced a package of policies and follow-up measures to stabilize the economy, involving ensuring smooth access in the field of foreign trade, increasing fiscal, taxation, and financial support, encouraging the development of new foreign trade formats, supporting foreign trade enterprises to ensure orders and expand the market, and continuously improving the level of trade security and facilitation
.
With the continuous release of the effectiveness of these policies and measures, the vitality of China's foreign trade entities has been effectively stimulated
.
In 2022, the number of foreign trade enterprises with import and export performance increased by 5.
6% over the previous year, and the three major categories of foreign trade entities, including private enterprises, foreign-invested enterprises and state-owned enterprises, gave full play to their respective advantages, and the import and export operation performed steadily
.

In view of the next stage of foreign trade trends, Lv Daliang judged that there are still many difficulties and challenges facing the development of China's foreign trade, at the same time, China's economy is expected to rebound overall this year, and there are many favorable conditions for foreign trade development, promoting the stable scale of foreign trade and the excellent structure has solid support
.

The trading partners have a good structure and good growth momentum

Data show that in 2022, China's imports and exports to ASEAN, the European Union and the United States will be 6.
52 trillion, 5.
65 trillion and 5.
05 trillion yuan, respectively, an increase of 15%, 5.
6% and 3.
7%.

During the same period, China's imports and exports to countries along the "Belt and Road" increased by 19.
4%, accounting for 32.
9% of China's total foreign trade value, an increase of 3.
2 percentage points; imports and exports to other RCEP member countries increased by 7.
5%.

It is worth mentioning that ASEAN has become China's largest trading partner
for three consecutive years.
Lu Daliang said that there are many reasons for the rapid growth of trade between China and ASEAN, including the trade creation effect brought about by the entry into force of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which has promoted closer cooperation in the industrial chain; The interconnection of facilities continues to advance, making economic and trade exchanges more convenient; Cooperation in agricultural products has deepened, and the scale of imports has been expanded
.

In recent years, China has accelerated the pace of importing agricultural products from ASEAN countries, continued to optimize the quarantine access procedures for key products such as agricultural products, and a variety of agricultural products such as fresh durian from Vietnam, longan from Cambodia, passion fruit from Laos and so on have obtained new quarantine access in China
.
In 2022, China imported 246.
86 billion yuan of agricultural products from ASEAN, an increase of 21.
3%, accounting for 15.
7% of the import value of China's agricultural products in the same period, an increase of 1.
4 percentage points
over the previous year.

Lu Daliang said that China-ASEAN economic and trade relations have a solid foundation and huge development potential
.
Looking forward to the future, bilateral trade between China and ASEAN is expected to achieve new and greater development driven by the continuous improvement of trade and investment liberalization and facilitation between the two sides, driven by the broad fields of cooperation, the integration of development strategies and
smooth trade exchanges.

On January 1, 2023, the first anniversary
of RCEP's official implementation.
Over the past year, China has implemented RCEP with high quality, continuously released policy dividends, and promoted regional economic integration to deepen.

According to customs statistics, in 2022, China's imports and exports to the other 14 RCEP member countries will be 12.
95 trillion yuan, accounting for 30.
8%
of the total import and export value of China's foreign trade.

Lv Daliang said that with the continuous release of RCEP policy dividends, the promotion of intraregional trade continues to appear
.
From the first to the fourth quarter of last year, China's imports and exports to other RCEP member countries accounted for 30.
4%, 30.
5%, 30.
7% and 31.
4% of China's total import and export value in the same period
, respectively.

In 2022, China's imports and exports to other RCEP member countries will grow by more than double digits in 8, of which the growth rate of imports and exports to Indonesia, Singapore, Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos will exceed 20%.

The import and export scale of South Korea ranked first in the import and export of China and other RCEP member countries, reaching 241 million yuan, an increase of 3.
2%.

The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed that the joint construction of the "Belt and Road" has become a popular international public goods and international cooperation platform
.
This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative, which has seen increasingly close trade exchanges with countries along the Belt and Road
.
Data show that from 2013 to 2022, China's imports and exports with countries along the Belt and Road increased by an average of 8.
6% per year, and in 2022, China's trade with countries along the Belt and Road continued to maintain rapid growth, with imports and exports of 13.
83 trillion yuan, an increase of 19.
4% over the previous year, 11.
7 percentage points
higher than the overall growth rate.
Among them, exports were 7.
89 trillion yuan, an increase of 20%; Imports were 5.
94 trillion yuan, an increase of 18.
7%.

Lv Daliang introduced that in 2022, the scale of imports and exports between China and countries along the route will reach a record high, accounting for 32.
9% of China's total foreign trade value, an increase of 3.
2 percentage points over the previous year, and an increase of 7.
9 percentage points
over 2013 proposed by the "Belt and Road" initiative.
In particular, imports and exports to trading partners such as the five Central Asian countries, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia have grown rapidly
.
In 2022, China's imports and exports to the five Central Asian countries, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia and other countries and regions increased by 45.
4%, 42.
1% and 37.
2% respectively, and imports and exports to ASEAN in the same period were 6.
52 trillion yuan, an increase of 15%, accounting for 47.
1%
of the total value of China's imports and exports to countries along the route.

In 2022, a total of 73 customs inspection and quarantine cooperation documents were signed with countries that jointly built the "Belt and Road", promoting the quarantine access or trade
of 60 agricultural products and foods.
Focusing on jointly building "Belt and Road" countries, vigorously promote international mutual recognition cooperation of "Authorized Business Operator" (AEO) and cooperation and exchanges of "single window" in international trade, and improve the level of
trade facilitation.
Vigorously promoting the facilitation of customs clearance for China-Europe trains, the "Guanxi Railway Connect" project between China and Kazakhstan launched trial operation in early 2022 at the Alashankou and Khorgos railway ports on the China-Kazakhstan border, and the "Guanxi Railway Link" project with Belarus is also accelerating to promote smooth trade
.

Lv Daliang said that in the next step, Customs will closely focus on promoting the high-quality development of the "Belt and Road", deeply practice the "three wisdoms" concept of "smart customs, smart border and smart connectivity", expand the breadth and depth of customs cooperation with countries and regions along the "Belt and Road", and make greater contributions
to promoting policy communication, facility connectivity and smooth trade.

"Looking forward to this year, the foundation of China's economic recovery is not yet solid, the external environment is turbulent, the downward pressure on the world economy is increasing, and there are still many
difficulties and challenges facing China's foreign trade development.
While facing these difficult challenges, we must also see that China's economy is resilient, potential, full of vitality, long-term good fundamentals remain unchanged, this year's economy is expected to rebound overall, and we must strengthen the confidence
in promoting the stable scale and excellent structure of foreign trade.
Lu Daliang said
.

China Food News(Version 02, January 17, 2023)

(Responsible editor: Han Songyan).