Beijing, Jan. 14, (dpa/GNA) – China posted strong foreign trade figures again in December in a sign of a sustained economic recovery.
Exports in December increased by 18.1 per cent year-on-year, Beijing customs authorities announced on Thursday, while imports were up by 6.5 per cent.
This followed a rise in exports in November of 21.1 per cent year-on-year while imports increased by 4.5 per cent.
Chinese factories are humming along as Beijing has managed to largely contain the novel coronavirus outbreak, which is still ravaging other parts of the world.
While the rest of the world is experiencing a recession, analysts believe that China will be the only major economy to have seen growth again in 2020.
Compared to the previous year, China’s exports grew by 3.6 per cent in 2020 as a whole. In light of the difficult economic conditions, imports fell by 1.1 per cent.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) had recently projected expected GDP growth of 1.9 per cent for 2020 in China. According to the forecast, growth this year could reach 7.9 per cent.
European companies active in China meanwhile fear new dangers for their business activities despite the recent breakthrough on an investment deal between Beijing and Brussels, according to a report published on Thursday.
Many worry that China and other major powers are drifting further apart, which could disrupt the flow of global trade, according to the report by the European Union Chamber of Commerce in Beijing and the China Institute Merics in Berlin.
The authors wrote that, even under incoming US President Joe Biden, the relationship between China and the United States is likely to remain tense.
Increasingly, China is working to make its economy more independent from the West, they said.
While the Biden administration is expected to be less aggressive than the current one, it is still likely to see China as a strategic competitor – meaning globalization is unlikely to continue as normal.
What the authors describe as “decoupling” is a trend that affects more than supply chains. China increasingly is branching out alone in terms of data, digital technology and industrial standards.
GNA