China foreign trade declines

Beijing, Sept 8: China's foreign trade in August dropped 9.7 percent year on year, official data showed on Tuesday.

The trade dropped to 2.04 trillion yuan ($320.8 billion), a steeper decline than the 8.8 percent contraction in July, Xinhua quoted the data as showing.

Exports fell 6.1 percent year on year to 1.2 trillion yuan, compared with an 8.9 percent drop in July.

The imports slumped 14.3 percent to 836.1 billion yuan, compared with July's decrease of 8.6 percent, according to data from the General Administration of Customs (GAC).

Trade surplus expanded by 20.1 percent to 368 billion yuan in August.

In the first eight months, foreign trade slipped 7.7 percent year on year to 15.67 trillion yuan.

Exports dipped 1.6 percent to 8.95 trillion yuan in the January-August period, while imports fell 14.6 percent to 6.72 trillion yuan.

In the first eight months, trade surplus jumped 80.8 percent to 2.23 trillion yuan, according to the GAC.

IANS