With the European Union (EU) surpassing the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to become China's largest trading partner in January-February 2022, China-EU trade demonstrates resilience and vitality, but it will take some more time to figure out if the EU can hold the top place over the long term, Chinese commerce ministry spokesman Gao Feng said recently.

"China is willing to join hands with the EU to proactively promote the liberalisation and facilitation of trade and investment, safeguard the stability and smooth operations of industrial and supply chains, and jointly elevate China-EU economic and trade cooperation to benefit enterprises and people of both sides," he was quoted as saying by official Chinese media.

During the January-February period, bilateral trade between China and the EU surged by 14.8 per cent year on year to reach $137.16 billion, which was $570 million more than the ASEAN-China trade value. China and the EU also achieved a record $828.1 billion in bilateral goods trade last year, according to the ministry.

"China and the EU are mutually important trading partners, and have strong economic complementarity, wide cooperation space and great development potential," Gao said.

The spokesman also said the implementation of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership agreement in Malaysia will further boost trade and investment cooperation between China and Malaysia, and benefit enterprises and consumers of both countries as the two countries deliver on their market openness commitments and apply RCEP rules in various areas.

That will also enhance the optimisation and deep integration of regional industrial and supply chains to make more contributions to regional economic growth, he added.

China is the largest trading partner of Malaysia. Data from the Chinese side showed bilateral trade value was worth $176.8 billion in 2021, up 34.5 per cent year on year.

Chinese exports to Malaysia grew by about 40 per cent to $78.74 billion while its imports from the latter surged about 30 percent to $98.06 billion.

Gao also said China will continuously expand high-level opening-up and always welcomes investors from any country to do business and expand presence in China.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)

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