Shenzhen maintained its lead among domestic cities in terms of exports for the 26th consecutive year in 2018, according to Shenzhen Customs on Wednesday.
The city’s imports and exports amounted to 3 trillion yuan (US$442 billion) last year, representing a 7-percent growth compared to the same period last year. Exports accounted for 1.63 trillion yuan of the figure, topping medium-sized and large cities in China for the 26th consecutive year, according to the official data.
The data showed that the city’s traditional areas of trade, including general foreign trade, processing trade and bonded logistics, continued to grow last year. General trade rose 5.9 percent, accounting for 46.3 percent of the city’s total imports and exports, while processing trade and bonded logistics increased 16 percent and 11 percent, respectively.
New types of trade, such as cross-border e-commerce and leasing, showed strong development momentum. Cross-border e-commerce generated 6.77 billion yuan last year, 1.3 times higher than in 2017, and the leasing industry contributed 540 million yuan to the city’s total imports and exports last year, 3.7 times higher than in the previous year.
It is worth mentioning that Shenzhen’s private high-tech enterprises have become a major player in the overseas market as well as a main growth engine for exports.
According to the official statistics, the total foreign trade volume of Shenzhen’s private enterprises grew 12.9 percent last year, making up 53.8 percent of the city’s total foreign trade, up 2.8 percent compared with 2017. They contributed 94 percent to the growth of the city’s foreign trade last year.
Additionally, a total of 12 private Shenzhen enterprises were included in China’s top 100 foreign trade companies last year.
Shenzhen enterprises have been focusing on independent innovation, and more high-quality Shenzhen-made products have been exported to the international market. At the same time, the city has developed an advanced manufacturing industry with mobile phones, integrated circuits and other high-tech products as its pillar.
Meanwhile, Guangdong’s foreign trade surpassed the 7-trillion-yuan mark for the first time last year to hit 7.16 trillion yuan, a growth of 5.1 percent over 2017, according to Guangdong Customs. The amount made up 23.5 percent of China’s total foreign trade.
Guangdong’s top seven trading partners are Hong Kong, ASEAN countries, the United States, the European Union, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan.