In the first five months, China’s service trade increased by 10.2% year on year.

　　On July 6, Shu Yuting, spokesperson of the Ministry of Commerce, introduced at a regular press conference that from January to May 2023, China’s service trade maintained an overall growth trend. The total import and export of services was 2,605.54 billion yuan (RMB, the same below), up 10.2% year-on-year. Among them, exports were 1,098.22 billion yuan, down 4.7%; Imports reached 1,507.32 billion yuan, up by 24.2%; The service trade deficit was 409.1 billion yuan.

　　Kevin·Z, an associate researcher at China Service Outsourcing Research Center, told the Economic Information Daily that the growth of China’s service trade continued to improve from January to May, and the import and export volume of services achieved double-digit growth year-on-year. It can be predicted that with the acceleration of international cooperation in China’s service industry, China’s total service trade will reach a new high in the whole year.

　　It is worth noting that while the total volume has maintained rapid growth, the structure of China’s service trade has continued to optimize, and the proportion of knowledge-intensive service trade has increased. From January to May, the import and export of knowledge-intensive services was 1,122.78 billion yuan, up 13.6% year-on-year, accounting for 43.1% of the total import and export of services, up 1.3 percentage points over the same period of last year. Among them, the export of knowledge-intensive services was 656.59 billion yuan, up by 17.2%, and the import of knowledge-intensive services was 466.19 billion yuan, up by 8.8%.

　　In Kevin·Z’s view, this is the concrete embodiment of the continuous improvement of the development quality of China’s service trade. "From the data point of view, China’s knowledge-intensive service trade continued to maintain a rapid growth trend in the first five months, accounting for a steady increase in the total import and export of services, and has become the strength to build a new development pattern of services and promote the high-quality development of trade in the new era."

　　In addition, travel services have obviously recovered. From January to May, the import and export of travel services reached 552.54 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 67%, making it the fastest-growing service trade field. Among them, exports increased by 53.4% and imports increased by 68.1%. Kevin·Z analyzed that from January to May, China’s travel service achieved a leap-forward growth, with a year-on-year increase of over 60%, and the recovery momentum was strong, which became an important driving force for the steady growth of service trade.

　　The favorable factors for the development of China’s service trade are still accumulating. Kevin·Z said that with the accelerated popularization of the new generation of information technology and the accelerated development of digitalization and intelligence, digital trade with digital technology, digital products, digital services and data information as its subject matter is booming. China’s digital industry has developed rapidly. At present, it is the second largest digital economy in the world, with a number of digital enterprises with strong international comparative advantages. At the same time, it benefits from a super-large market with a population of 1.4 billion, which provides fertile ground for the development of digital trade and has great development potential. In the future, digital trade will become a new engine for the development of China’s service trade, and will also make greater contributions to the prosperity and development of global trade.