China maintained two-digit growth in service trade in 2018, and experts predict that the country can continue this steady and healthy development in 2019, Economic Daily Net reported on Jan. 3.

The rapid increase of service trade indicated China’s rising demand for high-end production service and the improvement of per capita income, said Luo Libin from Beijing International Studies University.

From January to November 2018, service exports grew faster than service imports, statistics indicated. Luo explained that the slowdown of growth of tourism service imports is an important factor for the overall growth slowdown.

For the first 11 months of 2018, the country's service trade climbed to 4.74 trillion yuan (about $690.7 billion), said Li Jun with the Ministry of Commerce (MOC).

Service exports grew 14.7 percent year on year, while service imports increased 10 percent from a year earlier, statistics showed.

Experts said that trade growth in sectors including telecommunication, computing and information service, technical service, and personal entertainment service, contributed to the growth of service exports.

The impetus for the growth of service trade is expanding, driven by the rising export capability of services, rapid consumption grade, and the further opening of the service sector, said Li Aimin with the MOC, adding that in 2019 China’s service trade will continue to increase steadily.