my country's foreign trade growth will remain at 15% next year

"In 2004, China's total import and export trade volume will exceed one trillion US dollars for the first time, reaching about 1.1 trillion US dollars, and China's ranking in global trade is expected to rise to the third place. It will be lower than that in 2004, but it will still maintain a growth rate of about 15%." On November 12, the "Report on China's Foreign Trade Situation" jointly issued by the Planning and Finance Department of the Ministry of Commerce and the Institute of International Trade and Economic Cooperation (Autumn 2004) make the above predictions.

It is understood that this year, the world economy has shown a good momentum of development, international trade has accelerated, and cross-border direct investment has become more active. In the first three quarters, the total value of China's foreign trade imports and exports approached the scale of 2003, reaching US$828.55 billion, a year-on-year increase of 36.7%; the cumulative trade surplus was US$3.93 billion.

According to the analysis of the report, my country's foreign trade in 2004 showed six characteristics:

Imports and exports continued to grow rapidly, and foreign trade turned from deficit to surplus. In the first three quarters, foreign trade maintained a strong growth momentum. Except for January, which increased by 18%, the growth rate exceeded 27% in all other months. The scale of imports and exports in September exceeded the US$100 billion mark for the first time, reaching US$106.6 billion.

The export of electromechanical and high-tech products increased substantially, and the import of resource products increased significantly. The exports of electromechanical and high-tech products increased by 44% and 54.3% year-on-year respectively, and their proportions in total exports rose to 54.1% and 27.1% respectively. Imports of resource commodities such as iron ore, crude oil and refined oil that are in short supply in the country increased rapidly, up 36.6%, 34.4% and 28.6% year-on-year respectively. In addition, the export of traditional bulk commodities such as textiles, clothing, and furniture increased rapidly; however, the export volume of most primary products declined to varying degrees.

The prices of imported and exported commodities rose, and the prices of primary products rose sharply. Among them, the average import prices of iron ore, copper and soybeans increased by 107.9%, 40.8% and 46.5% respectively year-on-year, a relatively large increase. Among the export commodities, the average export price of coke and semi-coke, coal, corn, rice, automatic data processing equipment and its components also increased by a large margin.

The growth rate of processing trade has accelerated, and foreign-invested enterprises and collective private enterprises are the main drivers of growth. The import and export of processing trade was 387.92 billion US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 36.9%, and the growth rate was 2.9% higher than that of last year. The import and export of general trade was 358.64 billion US dollars, an increase of 33.8%, and the growth rate was 5.6% lower than that of last year. With the rapid growth of attracting foreign investment, the growth rate of foreign investment in equipment and goods imports accelerated, reaching 52.4% in the first three quarters.

Imports and exports to major markets increased across the board, and the ranking of major trading partners changed. The growth rate of imports and exports between China and its major trading partners has remained above 26%. Among them, the bilateral trade with South Korea, Australia and Canada increased by 46.7%, 50.3% and 56.2% respectively. The EU has become China's largest trading partner for the first time after its eastward enlargement; the United States has replaced Japan as China's second largest trading partner with a slight advantage; Japan is still China's largest source of imports.

The scale of imports and exports in the eastern region continued to expand, and some provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in the central and western regions grew rapidly. The total import and export of Jiangsu, Shanghai and Zhejiang provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Delta region reached 301 billion US dollars, accounting for 36.3% of the national total, an increase of 2.5 percentage points over last year. A total of 12 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in the central and western regions have seen their import and export growth exceed the national average.

According to the report, the main reasons for the rapid growth of China's foreign trade in 2004 are: macro-control has laid a solid foundation for the development of foreign trade; the rapid growth of the national economy, especially investment, has driven a substantial increase in import demand; the accelerated recovery of the world economy has expanded exports Room for growth; the reform of the export tax rebate mechanism, the further liberalization of foreign trade management rights, the continuous improvement of national and local policies to encourage foreign trade development, and the further deepening of China's participation in regional economic cooperation have all provided impetus for the development of foreign trade.

In addition, the report also forecasts the situation of China's foreign trade in 2005. The report predicts that in 2005, the international and domestic situation will still have the basic conditions to support the development of foreign trade, but the development environment will be tighter than in 2004. The main reason is that there are still some uncertain factors in the development of the world economy; the problem of international trade friction will become more prominent; after the reform of the export tax rebate mechanism, some new situations and problems may arise.