China says declines in trade will be reduced after March – swissinfo.ch

BEIJING (Reuters) – Declines in China’s foreign trade will be reduced after March, although it is expected that trading conditions are more severe this year than in 2015, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce said on Wednesday <. / p>

“There is a growing momentum in foreign trade growth,” he said Shen Danyang told reporters in Beijing. “We expect declines in trade will be reduced gradually from March,” he said.

China’s February exports posted their biggest decline since May 2009, while imports also failed to meet forecasts with a decline for the sixteenth consecutive month.

the Chinese leaders meeting this month at the annual session of parliament did not specify a target for trade this year, after repeatedly violating the goals of recent years, which reflects deep uncertainty about global demand.

Danyang said the weak trade performance in January and February the Lunar New Year holidays due. “But the trade situation this year is worse and more complex than in 2015,” he said.

The ministry spokesman also said that foreign direct investment non-financial (FDI) in China, an indicator of the health of the external economy, rose 1.8 percent in February compared with the same month last year to 8,440 million dollars.

earlier, the ministry said FDI from January to February grew 2.7 percent over the preceding year 22.520 million.

(Reporting by Shao Xiaoyi and Nicholas Heath. Published in Spanish by Carlos Aliaga)