China mulls foreign trade improvement

China is trying to address the slowing foreign trade growth by picking up speed in constructing an international marketing network highlighting trade facilitation, officials said at a meeting on Thursday.

The world's second-largest economy should break the "bottleneck" of foreign trade by breeding "fresh advantages" in terms of technology, brands, quality and service, Chinese Vice Commerce Minister Zhong Shan told a meeting focused on international marketing network construction.

The Ministry of Commerce (MOC) forecast that China's foreign trade would grow 6 percent year on year in 2012, lower than the annual economic growth target of 7.5 percent.

In the first ten months, China's foreign trade increased 6.3 percent from the same period last year, while the growth rate further slipped in November, according to MOC data.

Chinese export-oriented enterprises should reduce export trade links, diversify competition and expand sales of brand products and products with high added value in a bid to improve business performance, said Zhong.

Currently, Chinese enterprises operate more than 26,700 liaison offices as part of the international marketing network. Of the total, 83 percent have been invested with less than 1 million U.S. dollars and 95 percent take in less than 10 million U.S. dollars in revenue, he said.

In 2011, the network's overseas sales revenue totaled 81.05 billion U.S. dollars, accounting for 4 percent of the country's gross export value, according to Zhong.

Experts attending the meeting suggested Chinese enterprises should collaborate in forming industry magnates like foreign brands Wal-mart and Carrefour instead of selling their products via wholesalers, merchants and small shops.