Shenzhen has seen its foreign trade up 2.7 percent year on year to 2.18 trillion yuan (US$324.9 billion) between January and September, statistics from Shenzhen Customs show.
Exports dropped by 0.9 percent to 1.19 trillion yuan, while imports jumped by 7.3 percent to around 990.4 billion yuan.
The export volume of the city in the first nine months still remained the top among Chinese cities.
In September alone, Shenzhen’s trade volume reached 298.5 billion yuan, up 6.8 percent year on year, marking positive growth for the sixth consecutive month.
The export of computers and other equipment and their components totaled 117.4 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.5 percent, while household appliances grew by 7 percent. Driven by the steady recovery of the domestic economy and the overall work resumption of the manufacturing industry, imports in September increased by 19.6 percent to 144.7 billion yuan. The import of electronic components and industrial machinery increased by 14.8 percent and 14.3 percent to 506.3 billion yuan and 117.7 billion yuan, respectively.
The import of agriculture produce increased by 30.8 percent to 64.7 billion yuan.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the European Union (EU) and the United States remain the city’s major trading partners. In the first three quarters of the year, imports and exports with ASEAN totaled 336.5 billion yuan, an annual increase of 9 percent. Trade with the EU and the United Kingdom increased by 3.6 percent and 3.2 percent to 202.9 billion yuan and 34.6 billion yuan, respectively.
It is worth noting that private enterprises continued to play a pivotal role in stimulating the city’s foreign trade, as trade volume for private firms grew 7.3 percent year on year to 1.3 trillion yuan, driving the city’s foreign trade up 4.2 percentage points.