China's diversified trade layout demonstrates strong resilience

The Times of India, December 8th article, original title: In the tariff drama of the United States, has China achieved a trillion dollar victory in trade tariffs? What tariffs? The trade data released by China this week shows that in the first 11 months of this year, China's trade surplus exceeded the $1 trillion mark. This is undoubtedly a powerful counterattack against the United States' containment of its manufacturing strength and growth momentum. This marks China's further consolidation of its position as a "manufacturing powerhouse".

Despite ongoing pressure from US tariff policies, this milestone achievement has still arrived. Chinese manufacturers have demonstrated strong resilience by reducing their dependence on the US market and actively expanding into diversified markets. In contrast, India still faces significant challenges in dealing with external pressures. The latest data shows that in November 2025, China's exports to the United States decreased by nearly 29% year-on-year, marking the eighth consecutive month of decline. However, at the same time, China has effectively compensated for the loss of exports to the United States through significant export growth to the European Union, Southeast Asia, India, and Africa.

Although the United States has to some extent reduced imports from China, the strong momentum of Chinese exports still has a significant impact on many countries, including India. In the fiscal year 2024-2025, India will experience a huge trade deficit between imports from China and exports to China. India imports a large amount of high-end products such as electronic products, mobile phones, machinery, batteries, and solar panels from China. Although these products meet India's domestic demand, they also pose competitive pressure on the local manufacturing industry.

Faced with such a huge surplus, economists and policy makers are all shocked, especially against the backdrop of continued pressure from the US tariff policy towards China. As of now, China's trade surplus of 1.076 trillion US dollars achieved in 2025 has exceeded the record of 992 billion US dollars set last year in a relatively favorable environment, highlighting the resilience and breadth of China's export engine under trade tensions and tariff barriers.

China's continuously expanding trade surplus is mainly due to the reorganization of its export markets. In November 2025, China's exports to the European Union increased by approximately 14.3% year-on-year; Although exports to the United States plummeted by 28.6%, China's exports in November increased by 5.9% year-on-year, with exports to Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America growing by 26%, 14%, and 7.1% respectively. This structural transformation may profoundly affect the future global manufacturing landscape. The huge trade surplus also provides China with important macroeconomic buffer space. China's dominant position in global trade is so significant that even American media have to express admiration. (Author Chidanande Rajijata, translated by Liu De)

On December 8th, the Wall Street Journal reported that China's trade surplus in goods has exceeded the $1 trillion mark, highlighting China's dominant position in various fields from high-end electric vehicles to low-end T-shirts. This astonishing figure is the result of decades of China's industrial policies and the hard work of its people, which have helped China rise from a poor agricultural country to the world's second-largest economy.

In the 1980s and 1990s, China became famous for producing cheap wigs, sneakers, and Christmas lights, earning the title of "World Factory". But afterwards, China took big strides towards upgrading to high value-added products and became an indispensable part of the global supply chain, with its business covering fields such as technology, transportation, pharmaceuticals, and consumer goods. In recent years, its leading companies have established dominant positions in fields such as solar panels, electric vehicles, and semiconductors.

China's strong industrial strength has long been well-known to its trading partners. Last year, China's trade surplus reached 992 billion US dollars. Now that it has surpassed the trillion dollar mark, the scale of China's dominant export position is more clearly highlighted. Despite facing increasing tariffs from the world's largest economy, the United States, China's overall exports continue to grow.

Despite intensifying geopolitical headwinds, few economists expect China's trade momentum to significantly slow down in the coming months or even years. For example, Morgan Stanley economists predict that China's share of global commodity exports will increase from around 15% currently to 16.5% by the end of this decade. This will benefit from China's leading advantage in advanced manufacturing, which means that "China has the ability to predict changes in global demand trends and is willing to mobilize resources to build production capacity to meet demand". (Translated by Jonathan Cheng and Xin Bin)