In the first half of 2024, the foreign trade volume of Taicang, a county-level city under the jurisdiction of Suzhou, Jiangsu province, reached 57.91 billion yuan ($8 billion), increasing by 9.4 percent year-on-year, according to the data from Taicang Customs.

A view of Taicang in Suzhou, East China's Jiangsu province. [Photo/WeChat account: tcfbgw]

Specifically, its exports amounted to 33.03 billion yuan, growing by 15.5 percent, while imports totaled 24.88 billion yuan, rising by 2.3 percent.

Foreign-invested enterprises were one of the main driving forces of the growth, contributing 5.4 percentage points. Their total import and export volume reached 36.26 billion yuan, growing by 8.6 percent and accounting for 62.6 percent of the city's total.

Trade with major countries and regions continued to grow.

The combined value of imports and exports with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the European Union (EU) amounted to 13.52 billion and 12.93 billion yuan, respectively, signifying growth rates of 8.2 percent and 3.2 percent and constituting 23.3 percent and 22.3 percent of the total trade volume, respectively.

Furthermore, Germany has emerged as Taicang's largest trading partner, with the import and export volume between the two entities reaching 6.94 billion yuan, representing an uptick of 10.6 percent.

Trade with the United States and Japan both reached 4.76 billion yuan, increasing by 7.9 percent and 2.3 percent, respectively. Imports and exports with Latin America were 4.51 billion yuan, surging by 23.9 percent.

Accounting for 74.5 percent of the city's total export value, exports of mechanical and electrical products increased by 20 percent to 24.6 billion yuan.

The export figures for containers, ships, and auto parts demonstrated an increase of 61.9 percent, 81.2 percent, and 36.7 percent, respectively. This collective surge accounted for 10.6 percentage points of the city's export growth.

China's "new trio" export category, comprising electric vehicles, lithium batteries, and photovoltaic products, attained a combined value of 370 million yuan, representing an upturn of 71.7 percent.