On July 25, Foshan Customs released the foreign trade import and export data for the first half of 2023. The data showed that the import and export volume has reached 337.77 billion yuan in the first half of 2023, of which exports amounted to 288.25 billion yuan and imports amounted to 49.52 billion yuan.

There were several bright spots in Foshan's foreign trade in the first half of the year. Firstly, general trade accounted for more than 80%. In the first half of the year, Foshan's foreign trade structure continued to optimize, with a total import and export value of 273.29 billion yuan through general trade, an increase of 12.6%, accounting for 80.9% of the total import and export value. Meanwhile, imports and exports through processing trade amounted to 43.26 billion yuan, and imports and exports through bonded logistics amounted to 2.95 billion yuan.

Secondly, private enterprises remain the mainstay. In the first half of the year, the import and export volume of private enterprises in Foshan amounted to 254.58 billion yuan, a slight increase of 0.4%, accounting for 75.4% of the total foreign trade value. Additionally, foreign-invested enterprises had an import and export volume of 82.51 billion yuan, and state-owned enterprises had an import and export volume of 690 million yuan.

Thirdly, there was a remarkable growth in import and export with ASEAN countries. In the first half of the year, Foshan's import and export volume with ASEAN countries reached 89.28 billion yuan, an increase of 27.3%, which drove the growth of Foshan's foreign trade by 5.4 percentage. The import and export volume with Hong Kong was 15.68 billion yuan, an increase of 1.2%, and the import and export volume with Australia was 12.8 billion yuan, an increase of 63.3%. In addition, Foshan's imports and exports with other countries along the Belt and Road Initiative increased by 11.7% and 17.3% respectively. Foshan's imports and exports with other major trading partners such as the United States, the EU, and Japan were 44.14 billion yuan, 37.65 billion yuan, and 12.56 billion yuan, respectively.

Fourthly, mechanical and electrical products were the main export commodities. In the first half of the year, Foshan's exports of mechanical and electrical products reached 149.52 billion yuan, a slight increase of 0.2%, accounting for 51.9% of the total export volume. Among them, exports of household appliances reached 33.57 billion yuan, exports of lamps and lanterns reached 10.38 billion yuan, and exports of auto parts reached 4.61 billion yuan. Exports of high-tech products (which overlap with mechanical and electrical products) reached 13.4 billion yuan, an increase of 8.6%.

In addition, Foshan's imports of high-tech products grew steadily in the first half of the year, while the effects of intelligent transformation and digital transformation began to emerge. During the same period, Foshan imported 3 billion yuan worth of flat panel display modules, an increase of 6.3%, integrated circuits worth 2.56 billion yuan, an increase of 24.9%, and high-tech products worth 7.39 billion yuan (which overlap with mechanical and electrical products), an increase of 8.1%.