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China:Export growth powered by textiles & electronics goods |
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2005-3-11
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It was textile exports and electronics goods to the US, Europe and Japan, which powered China''s export growth in the first two months this year.
According to the Commerce Ministry, exports rose 37 percent from a year earlier to $95.3 billion after climbing 33 percent in December while imports rose 8.3 percent to $84.2 billion, as the trade surplus reached $11.1 billion, up from a $7.9 billion deficit.
The trade surplus may fuel calls for China to loosen the yuan''s peg to the dollar, which the US and Japan say helps Chinese exporters by keeping the yuan''s value artificially low. Earlier on March 3, Commerce Minister Bo Xilai had informed in an interview that he expects this year''s trade surplus to be little changed from the $32 billion surplus in 2004.
As regards foreign trade targets this year the figure is set at 15 percent rise, less than half the growth rate in 2004, as revealed by Ma Kai, head of the National Reform and Development Commission, the country''s top planning agency, on March 5.
The US had a record $162 billion trade deficit with China last year and that may widen as a government clampdown on industrial expansion cools Chinese demand for imports.
With the abolition of global textile quotas from Jan. 1 and with the help of rising exports, China, as the world''s largest cotton user, is expected to pick up textile and garment exports by 15 percent to more than $110 billion. This will also be supplemented by the fact that higher demand is anticipated from Europe and the US.
Ben Simpfendorfer, an economist at JPMorgan Chase in Hong Kong commented: “The recent strength is owing to buoyant textile shipments, which have benefited from the removal of quotas, and electronic shipments which have benefited from a recent wave of foreign investment in North Asia.”
Meanwhile, fear lurks in the form of curbs likely to be setup by the US and European Union restricting import of cheap Chinese textiles. |
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