January Trade Surplus Falls     
By Lily Wang   

On February 15th, 2008 the General Administration of Customs of China announced China's foreign trade in January 2008. The total import and export value was US$199.83 billion, a year-on-year increase of 27.1%. The export value rose 26.7% to US$109.66 billion while the import value rose 27.6% to US$90.17 billion.
    The January trade surplus was US$19.49 billion, up 22.6%. "The trade surplus falls to lowest since last May", the Customs says, "Import growth outpaced export growth for the fourth month in a row.
   Since early last year, China has taken measures to curb exports and reduce trade surplus, such as lowering exports rebates and cutting down VAT (Value Added Tax) of imports as well as increasing exports tariffs of energy-intensive products. "The measures have been effective and the growth rate of trade surplus for 2008 will drop significantly," experts expressed.
   In January, the trade by general trade mode rose 37.2% to US$97.55 billion, of which US$51.9 billion for export, up 33.2%; US$45.65 billion for import, up 42%. The trade by mode of processing with supplied materials was US$81.85 billion, up 15.8% year-on-year. But the growth rate slowed by 9.9 percent points compared with the same period 2007.
   The exports and imports value by foreign-invested firms, state-owned enterprises and other companies in China achieved US$109.48 billion, up 20.1%; US$48.48 billion, up 32.9% and US$41.87, up 41.4% respectively.
   The European Union remained as China's largest trade partner in January, with bilateral trade of US$34.38 billion, up 30.1% year-on-year. The USA ranked the second with bilateral trade of US$26.23 billion, up 12.2%. The third was Japan with bilateral trade of US$20.18 billion, up 15.3%. The bilateral trade between China and India was US$4.64 billion, up 86.7%, becoming China's ninth largest trade partner.
   Among exported goods, the export value of mechanical and electric products was up 27.5% to US$62.21 billion in January. China exported 180 thousand tons of crude oil and 1.21 million tons of petroleum products in January respectively.
   For imported goods, the import value of primary products was up 61.8% to US$27.7 billion. China imported 13.94 million tons of crude oil and 3.23 million tons of petroleum products in January, up 1.8% and 16.7% respectively. China imported 30 thousand units of automobile in the same period, up 51%.