MOSCOW: Trade between Russia and China grew 3.6 percent in the first quarter of 2016 compared to the same period last year, China’s General Administration of Customs representative Huang Shengqiang said on Wednesday.
“In the first quarter of this year, the total volume of bilateral trade turnover between China and Russia amounted to 91.77 billion yuan [$14.2 billion], growing 3.6 percent,” Huang said.
In March, Russia’s trade envoy to China told Sputnik he expected bilateral trade between the two neighbor nations to grow this year after it slid by almost a third in 2015.
In an early 2016 reversal of last year’s trend, Chinese exports to Russian increased 6.2 percent in the first quarter, according to the customs official. Russian exports to China increased 1.1 percent, Huang said.
In this photo taken on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2014, a woman walks by barrels of wine in the state-owned Massandra winery in Yalta, Crimea
China’s exports to Russia are dominated by electric and labor-intensive goods, while imports from Russia are mainly oil, coal, iron ore and other resources, Huang noted.
In 2015, trade between the two countries fell 28.6 percent compared to 2014, according to Chinese customs figures. The slump came in reversal of previous trends, with bilateral trade increasing 6.8 percent between 2013 and 2014.
China’s total trade also fell in 2015 as the yuan lost value and the country’s economic growth slowed down to the lowest rate in over 25 years, prompting the national government to announce economic reforms.
