Trade: crazy figures for the Chinese economy – Les Échos

There is a world of difference between today’s China and the one that joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) twenty years ago. The country has risen to the position of the world’s leading exporting power. A few figures bear witness to the spectacular rise of the “factory of the world”.

Production increased tenfold in twenty years

Never has an economy experienced such growth in such a short time. In 2001, the added value produced by the Chinese economy was only 1,300 billion dollars. Twenty years later, it reached 14.300 billion.

The gap was thus considerably reduced with that of the United States and Europe, which “only” doubled over the same period.

13% of world trade

Since its accession to the WTO, Chinese exports to the rest of the world have increased almost continuously to nearly 2.500 billion dollars in 2019, against 326 billion in 2001. It now represents 13% of international trade, against 9% in 2001.

8 times more goods exported than twenty years ago

The share of goods in Chinese exports is overwhelming, at 2.3 trillion dollars, eight times more than in 2001.

In the European Union, “made in China” can be read more on the labels of our clothes and on the packaging of toys – 3 times more Chinese imports in both areas. But the “craziest” increases concern other sectors: aluminum imports have multiplied by… 39 and those of transport equipment have multiplied by 14. Europeans have also imported 10 times more machines, 9 times more beds and wood-paper, 8 times more steel and iron …

The increases are a little more moderate for the United States: 11.5 times more aluminum, 9.5 times more transport equipment, 7 times more machines …

A trade surplus multiplied by 5 with Europe

The trade balance between China and Europe tilts far more in Beijing’s favor today than twenty years ago. From 33 billion euros in 1999, it rose to 180 billion in 2020.

Despite trade war led by the Trump administration against Beijing, America’s trade deficit with China has also widened, from $ 83 billion twenty years ago to $ 310 billion today.

270,000 jobs destroyed in France

In twenty years, the explosion of the Chinese economy has cost France industrial jobs: according to the work of economist Clément Malgouyres, the increase in Chinese imports has led to the destruction of 270,000 jobs in France between 2001 and 2007, including 90,000 in industry.

In the United States, the losses reached between 2 and 2.4 million jobs from 1999 to 2011, according to economists David Autor, David Dorn and Gordon Hanson.

However, the low prices of “made in China” have benefited the wallet of the French: French households have earned 100 euros per month on average on their purchasing power since the mid-1990s thanks to the liberalization of trade with the countries. at low cost, according to economist Lionel Fontagné.

1.8 international standards

China aims to impose its own standards on the rest of the world but for the moment it is far from it. The country today produces only 1.8% of international standards. Although strongly increasing, this proportion remains “very far behind the United States, Great Britain, Germany, France and Japan, at the origin of 90 to 95% of these standards”, underlines the researcher Antoine Bondaz, in a report published in September by the Foundation for Strategic Research.