By Lily Bearings
©2004-2008
China's exports and imports rose 21.5 pct and 27.9 pct respectively in the first four months of 2008 from a year earlier, under calculations based on commerce ministry data on machinery and electronics products exports.
In a statement published on its website, the ministry said China exported 251.29 bln usd worth of machinery and electronic products in the four months to April, up 24.3 pct year-on-year.
The ministry said that segment accounted for 59.2 pct of China's total export volume, and grew 2.8 percentage points above the rate of overall export growth.
XFN-Asia calculations based on these percentages show that overall exports grew 21.5 pct to about 424.48 bln usd in the first four months of the year.
Meanwhile, the ministry said imports of machinery and electronic products totaled 173.31 bln usd, up 17.8 pct year-on-year, and accounting for 47.3 pct of total imports volume.
It added that the growth rate of imports in the segment was 10.1 percentage points lower that the growth rate of China's total imports.
This suggests that China's overall imports in the first four months rose 27.9 pct year-on-year to about 366.4 bln usd.
China's trade surplus in the first four months would be about 58 bln usd, with April surplus at around 16.66 bln usd, based on the figures provided for machinery and electronics products.
China booked a trade surplus of 41.42 bln usd in the first quarter of 2008.
Exports grew 21.4 pct in the three months to March while imports were up 28.6 pct.