Japan, the United States, and the European Union remained China's three top trading partners in 1999, according to figures released today by the General Administration of Customs.

The remaining seven largest trading partners are Hong Kong, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Republic of Korea, Taiwan, Australia, Russia, and Canada.

Japan kept its position as China's largest trading partner with the bilateral trade volume reaching 66.2 billion US dollars, up 14.3 percent. While China exported 32.4 billion US dollars worth of goods to Japan, its imports from Japan hit 33.8 billion US dollars, up 19.9 percent.

Trade volume between China and the United States grew 12.1 percent to 61.5 billion US dollars. China's exports to the US reached 42 billion US dollars, up 10.5 percent, and its imports from the US were 19.5 billion US dollars, up 14.7 percent.

Russia's position on the chart went down one notch, while Australia's rose. China's exports to Russia dropped from 1.84 billion US dollars to 1.5 billion US dollars, down 18.5 percent.

The bilateral trade volume between China and Australia grew 26 percent last year.

The total trade volume between China and its top ten partners was a total of 319.5 billion US dollars, accounting for 88.6 percent of China's overall trade volume.