China's service trade sees rapid development over past decade

China's service trade has witnessed rapid development from 2012 to 2021, Xinhua reported on Wednesday.

The imports and exports of China's service trade witnessed a 6.1 percent average annual growth from 2012 to 2021, 3.1 percentage points higher than that of the globe during the same period.

The value added of China's service sector increased by 1.49 times, and imported services exceeded $4 trillion, further strengthening the country's advantage in a super-large market.

The import and export of knowledge-intensive services increased at an average annual rate of 9.3 percent, with the proportion up 10.3 percent in the past ten years.

The scale of offshore service outsourcing increased 2.9 times, and the service outsourcing industry created 11.27 million jobs accumulatively in the past decade.

The total value of China's import and export of services exceeded $800 billion for the first time in 2021, setting a record high with a growth rate of 21.4 percent year-on-year.

Last year, the country's service trade deficit fell 67 percent from the previous year to $32.75 billion, the lowest since 2011. In the first half of this year, the service trade deficit narrowed further to $12.2 billion.

The current number of countries and regions having service trade business with China increased to over 200.

The 2022 China International Fair for Trade in Services is expected to be held between Aug 31 and Sept 5 at the China National Convention Center and Shougang Park in Beijing.

Entitled "Cooperate for better development, innovate for a greener future", this year's CIFTIS will include six activities such as a summit on global trade in services, a comprehensive exhibition, nine themed exhibitions, seven summit forums, 128 themed forums and five sideline events.

The 2022 CIFTIS will also have twenty-one inspection routes, over 70 business promotions and discussions and many events for new products and technologies to be released.

This year's CIFTIS has attracted 189 confirmed important guests, as well as 71 countries and international organizations as of Aug 22.

More than 400 of the world's top 500 enterprises and industrial leaders will participate in CIFTIS offline, taking the overall internationalization rate to 20.8 percent, up 3 percentage points from the previous year.

The total area of offline exhibition for the 2022 CIFTIS is 152,000 square meters, an increase of 26,000 square meters over the previous year.

Focusing more on opening-up and cooperation in service trade, green development and digitalization, the 2022 CIFTIS will continue to contribute wisdom and facilitation to the opening-up and development of service trade.