BEIJING, Sept. 1 (Xinhua) -- China saw increased trade in knowledge-intensive services during the first seven months of this year, although its total services trade declined amid COVID-19 epidemic, the Ministry of Commerce said on Tuesday.

China's total trade in services amounted to 2.62 trillion yuan (about 382.4 billion U.S. dollars) from January to July, down 15.2 percent year on year.

Service exports outperformed imports, with exports totaling 1.09 trillion yuan, down 1.4 percent, and imports hitting 1.53 trillion yuan, down 22.8 percent. This brought the deficit in such trade down 49.4 percent to 448.77 billion yuan, or a year-on-year decrease of 438.35 billion yuan.

China's trade of knowledge-intensive services reached 1.15 trillion yuan from January to July, up 8.9 percent year on year, accounting for 44 percent of the total services trade in January-July, and the ratio is up 9.7 percentage points from the same period last year.

Of the total, the exports of knowledge-intensive services reached 610.3 billion yuan, up 9.7 percent year on year, accounting for 56.2 percent of total services exports, and the ratio is up 5.7 percentage points from the same period last year.

The imports of knowledge-intensive services totaled 541.04 billion yuan in the first seven months, up 8 percent year on year, accounting for 35.3 percent of total services imports, up 10.1 percentage points year on year.

Imports of knowledge-intensive services registered rapid growth mainly in financial services and telecommunication, computer and information services.