China's agricultural produce trade deficit grew rapidly in 2008

Statistics released by the Ministry of Agriculture on March 4 show that in 2008, export growth for China' s agricultural produce slowed down, imports witnessed high-speed growth, and the trade deficit increased rapidly.

In 2008, the total import and export volume of China' s agricultural produce reached 99.16 billion USD, up by 27 percent year-on-year. Of which, export volume was 40.5 billion USD, with year-on-year growth dropping from 17.9 percent to 9.4 percent. Import volume reached 58.66 billion USD, an increase of 42.8 percent year-on-year. The trade deficit reached 18.16 billion USD, an increase of 3.4 times compared to the previous year.

In 2008, China exported 1.861 million tons of grain, down 81.2 percent year-on-year, and imported 1.54 million tons of grain, a decrease of 1.1 percent year-on-year. Net exports of grain amounted to 321,000 tons, down 96.2 percent year-on-year.

Imports and exports of cotton and sugar dropped year-on-year, and exports of fruits and vegetables recorded sluggish growth. Net imports of cotton stood at 2.168 million tons, down 16.4 percent year-on-year. Net imports of sugar amounted to 718,000 tons, dropping 33.7 percent year-on-year. Net exports of vegetables reached 8.091 million tons, up 0.2 percent year-on-year. Finally, net exports of fruit stood at 3.149 million tons, down 8.1 percent year-on-year.

Net imports of edible oilseeds reached 37.817 million tons, an increase of 23.5 percent year-on-year. Net imports of edible vegetable oil amounted to 7.922 million tons, falling 3.7 percent from the previous year.

The trade deficit in livestock products stood at 3.33 billion USD, a year-on-year increase of 37.6 percent. The trade surplus of aquatic products reached 5.21 billion USD, up by 3.8 percent compared to the previous year.

China' s main agricultural produce export markets were Japan, the EU, the US, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), China' s Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and South Korea. Exports to Japan and South Korea compared to the previous year dropped 8.1 percent and 12.1 percent respectively. Exports to the two countries accounted for 19 percent and 7.8 percent, respectively, of China' s total agricultural produce exports, falling 3.6 percentage points and 2 percentage points compared to the previous year. At the same time, exports to the EU, the US and ASEAN increased 16 percent, 16.1 percent and 16 percent respectively year-on-year, accounting for 15.5 percent, 12.7 percent and 11.3 percent of China' s total agricultural produce exports, increasing 0.9, 0.7 and 0.6 percentage points from the previous year.

China mainly imported agricultural produce from the US, ASEAN, Brazil, Argentina and the EU, up 57.9 percent, 30.2 percent, 89.8 percent, 62.2 percent and 32.5 percent, respectively, year-to-year. Compared to the previous year, the proportion of agricultural produce that China imported in 2008 from ASEAN and the EU dropped by 1.6 percentage points and 0.5 percentage points, respectively, while the proportion of agricultural produce that China imported from the US, Brazil and Argentina rose by 2.4, 3.3 and 1.7 percentage points, respectively.

The volume of agricultural produce imported and exported in the category of processing trade accounted for 10.6 percent of the total volume of China' s imported and exported agricultural produce, down 2.9 percentage points from the previous year.

Source: People's Daily Online