South Korean media: "Made in China is just socks and toys"? Stop looking at China with outdated eyes!

On April 10, the South Korean media Today Finance published an article stating that when mentioning "Made in China", many people will first think of cheap daily necessities or fashion items such as toys, socks, and suitcases. South Korean consumers often purchase inexpensive clothing and accessories on Chinese e-commerce platforms like AliExpress or Temu.

However, the main export commodities from China have shifted from labor-intensive light industries such as apparel, footwear, and suitcases to capital-intensive electromechanical products.

Last year, China's exports increased by 5.9%, reaching $3,577.2 billion, while imports grew by 1.1%, reaching $2,585 billion. Among these, the export value of electromechanical products reached $2,125.5 billion, accounting for 59.4% of total exports, an increase of 0.9 percentage points compared to the previous year (58.5%).

In 2016, the export value of electromechanical products was $120.94 billion, which surged by 28.9% to $198.57 billion in 2021, nearing $2 trillion.

The growth rate of electromechanical product exports slowed to 3.6% in 2022, and fell by 2.4% in 2023, dropping below $2 trillion. However, last year it increased by 7.5%, reaching $2.1255 trillion.

China's Electromechanical Products Import and Export Chamber of Commerce assessed that the increase in the proportion of electromechanical product exports reflects the flexibility of the electromechanical industry supply chain and export products, as well as the upgrading of industrial structure.

More notably, last year's trade surplus in electromechanical products reached $1140.5 billion, exceeding the overall trade surplus ($992.1 billion). In fact, China's trade surplus is mainly driven by electromechanical products.

Let us take a look at the export performance of various categories. According to statistics from the General Administration of Customs of China, the 12 major electromechanical products exported by China are automatic data processing systems, semiconductors, smartphones, automobiles, automotive parts, home appliances, machinery equipment, lighting equipment, ships, audio equipment, displays, and medical devices.

The total export value of only these 12 products reached $1.463 trillion. The top export item is the automatic data processing system ($206 billion). Automatic data processing systems refer to computers, servers, data storage devices, and other equipment capable of automatically inputting, processing, storing, and outputting data. Lenovo, which leads the global PC market, Huawei, which has achieved significant success in servers and cloud computing, and IEIT Systems are all notable companies in this field.

Ranking second is semiconductors ($159.5 billion). Semiconductors are China's largest import commodity, with an import value of $385.6 billion last year, resulting in a trade deficit of $226.1 billion in semiconductors. However, China is increasing the export of traditional semiconductors with processes of 14 nanometers and above. Last year, the export value also grew by 17.4%.

Ranking third is smartphones ($134.3 billion), and last year alone, China exported 813.9 million smartphones. Two-thirds of the global smartphone shipments of 1.22 billion last year were produced in China. This includes iPhones produced by Foxconn in China for Apple partners. As a reference, the average export price per smartphone exported by China last year was $165.

Ranking fourth is automobiles ($117.3 billion), whose export value has grown rapidly recently. Last year, China exported 6.4 million vehicles, an increase of 22.8%. Automotive parts exports ($93.4 billion) also increased by 6.6%, ranking fifth.

Ranking sixth to tenth are home appliances ($100.1 billion), machinery equipment ($64.2 billion), ships ($43.3 billion), lighting equipment ($42.1 billion), and audio equipment ($37.4 billion). Additionally, the export value of displays was $29 billion, and medical device exports were $19.7 billion.

Among the 12 items, ships ranked first with an export growth rate of 57.3%. From this, we can see the rise of China's shipbuilding industry; last year, the three indicators—shipbuilding volume, order volume, and backlog—were all ranked first in the world.

Original Source: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1828981110140042/

Disclaimer: The article represents the views of the author alone.