Well-known Chinese news site Sina recently reported on the 117th China Import and Export Fair (also known as the Canton Fair) which concluded on May 5. As China’s largest import/export fair, the Canton Fair is considered “symbolic.” It is China’s foreign trade barometer and wind vane. According to the official statistics of the Fair, the total contract value this year was US$28.1 billion, which represents a year-over-year decline of 9.64 percent. The number of business visitors also declined. This level of decline matches the actual first quarter import/export data that the General Administration of Customs (GAC) recently reported. It seems that meeting the goal of a six percent annual increase in trade that the central government set earlier, will be a difficult task. At this year’s Fair, the export of electromechanical products saw an overall increase, but exports to Japan, Russia, and the United States declined by 31.4 percent, 30 percent and 25.9 percent, respectively. Home appliances and consumer electronics products, which hold 47.5 percent of the total trade volume, suffered a significant decline. For example, the consumer electronics category saw a decline of 34.1 percent, year-over-year.
Source: Sina, May 6, 2015
http://finance.sina.com.cn/roll/20150506/065222114888.shtml