On December 8th, the General Administration of Customs released import and export data for November.
In the first 11 months of 2025, my country’s total import and export value of goods reached 41.21 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.6%. Exports totaled 24.46 trillion yuan, up 6.2%; imports totaled 16.75 trillion yuan, up 0.2%.
In November, my country’s goods trade growth rebounded, with total import and export value reaching 3.9 trillion yuan, up 4.1%. Exports totaled 2.35 trillion yuan, up 5.7%; imports totaled 1.55 trillion yuan, up 1.7%.
Wang Qing, chief macro analyst at Orient Securities, told 21st Century Business Herald that my country’s exports have shown strong resilience this year despite significant fluctuations in the external environment.
“my country’s exports to the EU and Belt and Road Initiative countries have accelerated significantly. Currently, exports to Belt and Road countries account for more than half of my country’s total exports, with a cumulative export growth rate of 10.5% in the first 11 months, significantly higher than the overall export growth rate of 5.4%.
Furthermore, the substantial increase in global AI investment this year, coupled with the significant results of my country’s manufacturing transformation and upgrading, has driven the continued rapid growth of exports of chips, new energy vehicles, and other products, providing important support for overall exports,” said Wang Qing.
ASEAN remains the largest trading partner
According to data from the General Administration of Customs, my country’s top three trading partners are ASEAN, the EU, and the US. During the same period, my country’s total imports and exports with countries participating in the Belt and Road Initiative reached 21.33 trillion yuan, an increase of 6%.
Specifically, in the first 11 months of this year, my country’s trade with ASEAN totaled 6.82 trillion yuan, an increase of 8.5%, accounting for 16.6% of my country’s total foreign trade; trade with the EU totaled 5.37 trillion yuan, an increase of 5.4%, accounting for 13% of my country’s total foreign trade; and trade with the US totaled 3.69 trillion yuan, a decrease of 16.9%, accounting for 8.9% of China’s total foreign trade.
In recent years, trade cooperation between my country and ASEAN has deepened continuously. China and ASEAN began the process of building a free trade area in 2002, and the first version of the free trade area was fully completed in 2010. After the establishment of the free trade area, both sides implemented zero tariffs on more than 90% of products.
China’s average tariff on ASEAN goods decreased from 9.8% to 0.1%, and the average tariff on China from the six original ASEAN member states decreased from 12.8% to 0.6%.
On October 28, the Protocol to Upgrade the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area to Version 3.0 was signed in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The Protocol covers nine aspects, including the digital economy, green economy, and supply chain connectivity.
Ding Yusen, Director of the Information Center of the Southeast Asian Economic and Political Research Institute of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, told a reporter from 21st Century Business Herald that the 8.5% growth rate not only indicates that ASEAN has become a core engine of my country’s foreign trade growth, but also reflects a deep-seated optimization of the country’s foreign trade structure.
Intermediate goods, mainly electromechanical products, dominate bilateral trade, signifying that cooperation between the two sides has shifted from simple commodity trading to deep integration within the industrial chain, jointly forming a “southern hub” of the global supply chain.
Strong exports of the “new three pillars”—new energy vehicles, photovoltaics, and lithium batteries—indicate that the two sides are accelerating integration in the green and digital fields, forming a new three-dimensional collaborative model of “Chinese technology + ASEAN manufacturing.”
Ding Yusen emphasized: “Against the backdrop of current global economic turmoil, the close cooperation between China and ASEAN injects much-needed stability into the world economy.”
Significant advantages in chips and new energy vehicles
Data shows that my country’s import and export structure is continuously optimizing, with both imports and exports of machinery and electronic products showing a high growth trend.
In the first 11 months of this year, my country’s exports of machinery and electronic products reached 14.89 trillion yuan, an increase of 8.8%, accounting for 60.9% of total exports. Among them, automatic data processing equipment and its parts reached 1.31 trillion yuan, a decrease of 1.3%; integrated circuits reached 1.29 trillion yuan, an increase of 25.6%; and automobiles reached 896.91 billion yuan, an increase of 17.6%. During the same period, imports of machinery and electronic products reached 6.69 trillion yuan, an increase of 5.5%.
During the same period, the proportion of labor-intensive products gradually declined. Data from the General Administration of Customs shows that exports of labor-intensive products reached 3.7 trillion yuan, a decrease of 3.5%, accounting for 15.1% of total exports. Among them, clothing and accessories reached 987.26 billion yuan, a decrease of 3.7%; textiles reached 931.33 billion yuan, an increase of 1.7%; and plastic products reached 677.6 billion yuan, a decrease of 0.5%. Exports of agricultural products reached 670.21 billion yuan, an increase of 2%.
Regarding the optimization of the foreign trade structure, Wang Qing pointed out: “Amidst the drastic fluctuations in the external economic and trade environment, the advantages of my country’s manufacturing industry transformation and upgrading are becoming increasingly apparent, which is a key reason why the resilience of foreign trade this year has exceeded general expectations.”
Wang Qing stated that the world is currently experiencing an AI investment boom, and within AI investments such as computing centers, traditional chips still account for a significant proportion.
Industry data shows that my country currently accounts for about one-third of global production capacity in traditional manufacturing processes, and is also catching up in the high-end chip sector. This is the main reason for the simultaneous rapid growth in the import and export of integrated circuits and even the overall electromechanical products.
Furthermore, due to my country’s leapfrog development in the new energy vehicle sector, possessing significant technological and cost advantages, automobile exports have recently maintained high growth. The rapid development of new-type productivity is not only a major support for the counter-trend growth of foreign trade but also plays a significant role in driving overall economic growth.
Opportunities and challenges coexist
The “Suggestions of the CPC Central Committee on Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development” (hereinafter referred to as the “Suggestions”) proposes to expand high-level opening-up, promote innovative development of trade, improve the quality and efficiency of foreign trade, and accelerate the construction of a strong trading nation.
Looking ahead, Wang Qing predicts that foreign trade will face both opportunities and challenges in 2026. With the full implementation of various policies, the downward pressure on my country’s exports in 2026 is controllable, and employment in the foreign trade sector will remain stable.
Policies to stabilize foreign trade are likely to focus on the following aspects:
First, supporting enterprises to shift from export to domestic sales, mainly through measures such as vigorously boosting consumption and increasing effective investment demand, to expand domestic demand and help export enterprises expand their domestic sales channels both online and offline.
Second, increasing targeted support for export enterprises, focusing on financial support, ensuring that loans to enterprises temporarily facing difficulties are not withdrawn or interrupted, guaranteeing their reasonable financing needs; at the same time, further expanding the scale and coverage of export credit insurance and promoting the development of cross-border e-commerce.
Third, further implementing a market diversification strategy. Specific measures include signing or upgrading bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements with more economies and negotiating visa exemptions with more countries to help enterprises stabilize and expand overseas markets.
Regarding the proposal in the “Suggestions” to “expand high-level opening-up and create a new situation of win-win cooperation,” Wang Qing believes this means that the domestic economic cycle will be strengthened during the 15th Five-Year Plan period. In the future, my country will better utilize both domestic and international markets and resources, improving total factor productivity in economic growth through effective connectivity between domestic and international markets.
Wang Qing predicts that the next steps for my country’s opening-up and building a strong trading nation will focus on two key areas: First, leveraging my country’s large market advantage, expanding imports to cultivate the domestic consumer market and drive the transfer and upgrading of domestic manufacturing;
Second, further opening up the service sector, comprehensively enhancing its competitiveness, and building the “China Service” brand.
