China may overtake the United States to become the world's second largest exporter in 2007 if it maintains current export growth speed, said Vice Minister of Commerce Yu Guangzhou on China Economic Development Forum on August 18th.
According to Yu, China currently ranks third after Germany and the United States in export volume. It is highly possible that China will surpass the United States and become the world's second largest exporter in 2007, only next to Germany.
Figures show that last year China trailed behind the United States in total exports volume only by less than $70 billion, while its export growth rate is seven percentages higher than that of the United States. If calculated on the basis of current growth rate, China may exceed the United States in total export volume by $50 billion this year.
Observers expect that if China maintains current import and export growth rates, it will overtake Germany to be the world's top exporter in 2008 and possibly will surpass Germany to become the world's runner-up in terms of total foreign trade volume this year or by next year.
Customs statistics show that in the first half of this year, China's total import and export volume reached $980.9 billion, an increase of 23.3% year-on-year. Of this, exports grew 27.6% to $546.7 billion, while import reached $434.2 billion, up 18.2%.
Yu Guangzhou said that China's foreign trade structure has been gradually optimized in step with the growing foreign trade volume. Through readjusting tax rebate policies and processing trade policies, China has successfully lowered down the exports of high energy consuming and high pollution products.
By People's Daily Online
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