Canton fair expects more traders from emerging markets

The 113th China Import and Export Fair, starting Monday and running until May 5, is expected to see a pickup in the number of overseas traders compared with the previous fair, a spokesperson told a press conference Sunday.

The number of traders from the US visiting the fair will be the same and the number from the EU may fall, but traders from emerging countries and regions such as South America and Africa are expected to grow in number considerably, said spokesperson Liu Jianjun.

The biannual fair, also known as the Canton Fair, is seen as a barometer of China's trade.

The 112th session of the fair started in October 2012, and saw a decline both in the number of traders and transaction volume compared with the 111th fair, with the number of overseas traders falling 10 percent to 188,000.

China's trade rose 13.4 percent year-on-year in the first quarter, much higher than the 6.2 percent rise seen for the whole of 2012, according to data released by the General Administration of Customs.

Domestic firms' increasing demand for exhibition booths at the fair also indicates a turnaround in China's exports, as around 40 percent of domestic companies that had hoped to participate in the fair failed to get a booth, data showed.