Good prospects for foreign trade in rest of year

China's foreign trade will continue to show strong resilience for the rest of the year, boosted by its fast-growing private sector, and diversified export and import channels with partners participating in the Belt and Road Initiative, business leaders said on Monday.

They made the remarks after the General Administration of Customs announced that the total value of Chinese imports and exports of goods rose 3.6 percent year-on-year to 20.13 trillion yuan ($2.82 trillion) in the first eight months of the year. Its trade surplus stood at 239.6 billion yuan last month, expanding 41.8 percent from a year earlier.

The global economic uncertainty caused by protectionism has pushed China to raise its trade activities with countries such as Germany, France, Russia, South Korea and Japan to further tap their cooperation potential in areas such as high-tech, innovation, agriculture, finance and digital economy, said Liu Yuan, a researcher at the Research Institute for Global Value Chains at the University of International Business and Economics.