China will alleviate foreign trade impediments: Officials

China is expected to adopt more targeted measures to help solve problems and challenges facing foreign trade enterprises to ensure stable growth and improvement of trade quality, government officials said on Wednesday.

Vice-Minister of Commerce and Deputy China International Trade Representative Wang Shouwen said at a media briefing the ministry will take action to further reduce foreign trade enterprises' cost and improve their profitability, smooth transportation and logistics, help enterprises develop clients and get new orders, and facilitate development of new foreign trade formats such as cross-border e-commerce and overseas warehouse to boost the nation's foreign trade.

"We are confident and capable of ensuring expansion and upgrade in foreign trade," he said.

During the first four months, China's foreign trade expanded 10.1 percent year-on-year to $1.98 trillion, down 28.6 percentage points from the same period last year, official data showed.

According to Wang, external and internal uncertainties such as the weak global economic recovery and softer demand, high-level global inflation, performance decline in domestic logistics timeliness, clogs in industrial and supply chains and high raw material prices have all added pressure to the foreign trade sector.

Jin Hai, director-general of the General Administration of Customs' Department of General Operation, said customs authorities will continue to enhance regulations and services to guarantee smooth export and import logistics while also refining measures at local levels to ease the burden of enterprises and stabilize their expectations.