Yicai:

You just mentioned that imports and exports achieved stable growth in the first quarter. Could you please share some highlights and positive developments in China's foreign trade sector so far this year? Thank you.

Wang Lingjun:

Since the beginning of this year, despite weak global economic momentum, rising trade protectionism and ongoing geopolitical tensions, China's foreign trade has achieved steady growth in import and export volumes, while the quality of development has also continued to improve. These positive changes are reflected in four key aspects:

First, the vitality of business entities has further increased. In the first quarter, the number of Chinese enterprises engaged in import and export reached 529,000, an increase of 33,000 compared to the same period last year. Among them, the number of private enterprises reached a historical high of 455,000, accounting for 86.1% of all enterprises engaged in import and export during the same period.

Second, the scope of international cooperation has further expanded. In the first quarter, China's trade with traditional markets remained resilient, with imports and exports to Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom registering strong growth. The high-quality joint construction of the Belt and Road continues to deepen and deliver concrete results. The growth rate of imports and exports with BRI partner countries was 0.9 percentage points higher than the overall rate, including a 7.1% increase in trade with ASEAN and a 6.9% increase with the five Central Asian countries.

Third, the regional layout for opening up has been further optimized. China's central and western regions have continued to leverage their strengths, undertake industrial transfers in an orderly manner, and further unleash their foreign trade potential. In the first quarter, imports and exports in China's central and western regions reached 1.84 trillion yuan, an increase of 8.7%, which was 7.4 percentage points higher than the national average growth rate. Their share of the country's total foreign trade also rose by 1.2 percentage points year on year, reaching 17.9%.

Fourth, foreign trade now features more innovation and new growth drivers. New quality productive forces have accelerated development, cultivating a number of upstream and downstream enterprises in the equipment industry chain with strong supporting capabilities and excellent product performance, thus promoting China's foreign trade toward more new growth drivers. In the first quarter, imports and exports of equipment manufacturing products increased by 7.6%, accounting for nearly half of China's total foreign trade. New domestic products are constantly being launched, and the export scale of homegrown brands has increased year by year, with their share continuing to rise. In the first quarter, exports grew by 10.2%, and their proportion of the total export value further increased to 22.8%. Thank you.