NE China province sees growing trade with B&R countries

The foreign trade of Northeast China's Heilongjiang province with Belt and Road countries totaled 75.4 billion yuan (about $10.7 billion) in the first half of this year, a year-on-year increase of 25.45 percent, the provincial department of commerce said on Aug 8.

The figure accounted for 80.79 percent of the province's total foreign trade volume in the same period.

From Jan to June, Heilongjiang's imports and exports with ASEAN rose 33.25 percent year-on-year to 1.7 billion yuan, while imports and exports with the EU grew by 12.79 percent to 5.95 billion yuan. Its foreign trade with Russia, Japan and the Republic of Korea increased by 20.32 percent, 10.6 percent and 9.47 percent, respectively.

The structure of foreign trade has been optimized. In the first six months, the province's exports totaled 16.28 billion yuan. Among the export products, primary commodities totaled 2.79 billion yuan, down 0.75 percent while the manufactured goods saw a year-on-year increase of 29.29 percent to reach 13.48 billion yuan.

Imports gained 77.06 billion yuan during the same period, with primary commodities up 27.29 percent and manufactured goods down 3.46 percent.