China June imports down 6.7% — govt

BEIJING, China – China’s imports fell for the eighth consecutive month in June, official customs data showed Monday, dropping 6.7 percent year-on-year to 890.67 billion yuan ($142.83 billion).

Exports increased 2.1 percent to 1.17 trillion yuan on-year, and the country’s trade surplus leaped by 45.0 percent to 284.2 billion yuan, the General Administration of Customs said.

China is the world’s second-largest economy and its biggest trader in goods but Customs added that its total two-way trade for the first six months of the year fell 6.9 percent to 11.53 trillion yuan.

It is a far cry from the government’s official target for the year of growth of “about 6.0 percent”.

That was itself a reduction from 2014’s goal of 7.5 percent. In the event trade expanded only 3.4 percent last year, the third consecutive time the target had been missed.

June’s export’s rise snapped a run of three monthly declines in a row.

Gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 7.4 percent in 2014, the lowest rate in nearly a quarter of a century and signs of further weakened have mounted this year.

GDP expanded 7.0 percent in the January-March period, the worst quarterly result in six years.