Private firms overtook foreign-funded enterprises as the biggest contributor of China's foreign trade for the first time in 2019, customs data showed Tuesday.
The aggregate imports and exports generated by China's private firms went up 11.4 percent year on year to 13.48 trillion yuan (about 1.95 trillion U.S. dollars). The number accounted for 42.7 percent of the country's total, up 3.1 percentage points from 2018, according to the General Administration of Customs.
In breakdown, private firms' exports rose by 13 percent to 8.9 trillion yuan, taking up 51.6 percent of China's total exports in 2019, while their imports expanded by 8.4 percent to 4.58 trillion yuan, making up 32 percent of the country's total imports.
Foreign-invested companies took up 39.9 percent of China's foreign trade, with the trade volume falling 3.2 percent to 12.57 trillion yuan.
