SCIO briefing on China's imports and exports in 2017

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Speaker:
Mr. Huang Songping, spokesperson of the General Administration of Customs

Chairperson:
Xi Yanchun, vice director-general of the Press Bureau, State Council Information Office

Date:
Jan. 12, 2018

Die Welt:

I would like to know a little bit more why China is importing such an enormous amount of crude oil and iron ore. Considering China's domestic economic situation, does that mean the imports play a role in helping China enhance the quality and efficiency of its economic development?,. We know that the import prices have recently been nearly 30 percent higher, so that's not quite understandable. I have another question, that is, how reliable is the Customs data, since recently we have come across many reports questioning the authenticity of statistics released by some Chinese provincial-level regions, such as Liaoning and Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Many countries have such a doubt, as they think trade deficits they know are much higher than the Chinese figures. Thank you.

Huang Songping:

Thanks for your questions. The first one is about why China has been importing such large quantities of iron ore, crude oil and other bulk commodities. The reason is that China is a big manufacturing country where a substantial supply of raw materials and energy products are required. Last year, the economy achieved a stable and slightly upward curve, which fueled domestic demand and drove up the imports of bulk commodities. Besides, prices surged with the increase in demand as a result of the recovery of the global economy, not to mention the financial nature of the bulk commodities themselves. So, there are multiple reasons for the surge in bulk commodities imports and prices. This is the answer to your first question.

The second question is about the accuracy of the data released by Chinese Customs. Last year, China's foreign trade achieved double-digit growth, which brought to an end two straight years of negative growth. It should be attributed to the aforementioned global economic recovery, the increase of market demand, the surging prices of bulk commodities, the effects of policies adopted for the sustainable growth of foreign trade and the comparatively low base level, along with other positive factors. All of them contributed to the fast growth.

Take cross-border containers as an example. In 2017, Chinese customs inspected containers 109 million times, up 5.9 percent year on year, as well as 680 million tons of commodities inside the containers, a year-on-year increase of 6.1 percent. These also confirm the recovering, stable and sound momentum of China's foreign trade.

As to the specifics of your second question about the accuracy of the Customs' data, I would like to give you a concise answer. Imports and exports are essential to the compiling of China's macro-economic statistics. We have always attached great importance to the quality of these statistics and taken authenticity and accuracy as the supreme goal in our statistical work. We form statistics on the basis of data including customs declarations and follow international rules and criteria to incorporate the data of the commodities causing a rise or decrease of domestic inventories into the import and export trade statistics. Data analysis approaches are applied to screen abnormal numbers and verifications and investigations are implemented in companies whose reports arouse skepticism.

In late 2016, a total of 27 ministerial-level administration entities, including the National Development and Reform Commission, People's Bank of China and National Bureau of Statistics, jointly signed the "Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation in Implementing Joint Punishment on Seriously Dishonest Enterprises and Individuals in Statistics Reporting". According to the document, enterprises that fabricate import and export data in their report to the customs and cause distortions of statistics will face punishment jointly carried out by these institutions to ensure authenticity of statistics.

Just now, you said that there were differences in the statistics provided by China and other countries regarding China's foreign trade. 

Currently, most countries adopt the statistical standards and methods recommended by the United Nations Statistics Division. China's Customs use the same standards and methods, too. However, there are still many factors that may lead to differences in the result.

For example, some countries use the FOB price to calculate export volume and CIF price to calculate the import volume. The choice of which price to use may lead to different results. Entrepot trade is another factor that may cause differences. For example, Chinese goods may be re-exported via the Netherlands to a third country. China regards the Netherlands as the export destination and calculates the export volume accordingly. So, the figure we work out may be different from the figure calculated by the third country. Besides, the choice of an exchange rate and even the time difference may lead to different results.

The Rules on Implementation of Statistics Law of China was enacted on May 28, 2017. In the future, we will continue to work in accordance with the law to ensure the truthfulness and accuracy of the statistics regarding imports and exports. 

Thank you.

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