Germany records strong increase in trade with China in February

BERLIN, April 9 (Xinhua) -- German exports to China in February rose by 25.7 percent year-on-year to 8.5 billion euros (10.1 billion U.S. dollars), the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) announced on Friday.

China remained Germany's biggest import country in February as imported goods totaled 9.9 billion euros, an increase of 32.5 percent year-on-year, according to Destatis.

German exports to the United States decreased slightly to 9.5 billion euros in the month, while imports were even down 12.6 percent.

"It is worrying that the economic recovery in the United States is currently having little impact on German exports there, while foreign trade with China continues to grow steadily," said Anton Boerner, president of the Federation of German Wholesale, Foreign Trade and Services (BGA), in a statement on Friday.

Trade with the United Kingdom (UK), which withdrew from the European Union (EU) single market and customs union at the turn of the year, was also down significantly. Exports to the UK dropped by 12.2 percent year-on-year, while imports even plummeted 26.9 percent.

Since 2016, the year of the Brexit referendum, German exports to Britain have "steadily declined," Destatis already noted at the beginning of March. German exports to Britain in 2020 declined to 66.9 billion euros, after 89.0 billion euros in 2015.

With 107.8 billion euros, Germany's total exports in February were 1.2 percent lower than in the same month last year, just before COVID-19 restrictions were imposed in Germany. At the same time, the country's imports increased slightly by 0.9 percent to 89.7 billion euros, according to Destatis.

Germany's foreign trade was slowly approaching pre-crisis levels again as trade with EU member states recovered considerably, said Boerner. "This is a good indication of the EU's economic recovery." (1 euro = 1.19 U.S. dollars)