By Brenda Goh
SHANGHAI (Reuters) -China announced an initiative on Tuesday to increase imports, promoting itself as a super-sized market opportunity even as its trade surpluses with other countries swell amid frictions with the United States.
While China’s supply of manufactured goods to the world is growing, its contribution to global demand is much less significant, with imports barely growing, a dynamic economists have said fuels trade tensions abroad and deflationary pressures back home.
Commerce minister Wang Wentao said the “Big Market for all: Export for China” programme would include 10 major events featuring five to six countries per year, aiming to make China “the best export destination” and “open up win-win cooperation”.
Wang announced the events at a ceremony attended by Premier Li Qiang in Shanghai on the eve of the China International Import Expo (CIIE), which runs November 5-10 in the country’s financial hub of Shanghai.
CIIE was itself launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2018 to promote China’s free trade credentials and counter criticism of its trade surplus with many countries.
The event has been criticised in the past by the likes of the European Chamber of Commerce, which in 2023 said it was more of a “political showcase” than about doing business and that China’s trade surpluses with the likes of Europe were, in reality, continuing to grow.
China’s trade surplus this year is expected to beat 2024’s record of roughly $1 trillion as exporters offset a plunge in U.S. sales due to higher U.S. tariffs by selling more to the rest of the world – often at a loss in pursuit of market share.
In September, exports to the U.S. fell by 27% year-on-year, while shipments bound for the European Union, Southeast Asia and Africa grew by 14%, 15.6% and 56.4%, respectively.
(Reporting by Brenda Goh in Shanghai; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Alison Williams)
