(ICIS) -- China's foreign trade increased by 17.6% year on year in November to USD334.4bn (EUR250.8bn), while its trade surplus narrowed by 34.9% to USD14.5bn during the same month, China Customs said over the weekend.
On a year-on-year basis, China's exports grew by 13.8% to USD174.5bn, while its imports rose by 22.1% to USD159.9bn in November, according to the data released by China Customs. The growth in the country's exports has been slowing down for the past four consecutive months and November's growth figure is at a nine-month low.
China's crude imports in November increased by 8.5% year on year to 22.7m tonnes, the data showed.
The country's imports of acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) resins dropped by 19.7% year on year to 153,753 tonnes, while imports of polyester chips fell by 35.0% to 11,954 tonnes in November.
Its imports of natural rubber (NR) increased by 26.3% year on year to 240,000 tonnes, while imports of synthetic rubber decreased by 7.9% to 117,803 tonnes in that month.
In November, the country imported 204,000 tonnes of primary plastics, a 4.7% year-on-year decrease from the same period a year earlier.
China exported 715,731 tonnes of plastic products in November, an increase of 9.4% year on year, the data showed.