India-China trade climbs to $135.98 billion in 2022, trade deficit crosses $100 billion for first time

The trade between India and China has touched an all-time high of $135.98 billion in 2022 while New Delhi's trade deficit with Beijing crossed for the first time a $100 billion mark despite frosty bilateral relations, according to data released by Chinese customs on Friday.

The total India-China trade for 2022 has climbed to 135.98 billion, overtaking the $125 billion mark a year earlier by registering an 8.4 per cent increase, according to the annual Chinese customs data.

China’s exports to India climbed to $118.5 billion, a year-on-year increase of 21.7 per cent.

During 2022, China’s imports from India dwindled to $17.48 billion, a year-on-year decline of 37.9 per cent.

The trade deficit for India stood at $101.02 billion, crossing the 2021 figure of $69.38 billion.

This is the first time the trade deficit, a serious concern constantly expressed by India, has crossed the $100 billion mark.

In 2021, the overall trade with China totaled $125.62 billion, an increase of 43.32 per cent year on year crossing the USD 100 billion mark for the first time.

The trade deficit in 2021 stood at $69.56 billion as India’s imports from China witnessed an increase of 46.14 per cent to reach $97.59 billion.

India’s exports to China increased by 34.28 per cent year on year to reach $28.03 billion in 2021.

The trade between the two countries continued to boom despite border tensions following the military standoff in eastern Ladakh in May 2020.

According to an official brief on trade posted on the Indian Embassy website in Beijing, “the rapid expansion of India-China bilateral trade since the beginning of this century has propelled China to emerge as India’s largest goods trading partner by 2008”.

“Since the beginning of the last decade, bilateral trade between the two countries recorded exponential growth. From 2015 to 2021, India-China bilateral trade grew by 75.30 per cent, an average yearly growth of 12.55 per cent”, it said.

Also, on the global trade front despite the weakening of the US and European demand and the COVID-19 controls leading to periodic shutdowns of several cities including Shanghai, China posted a trade surplus of $877.6 billion in 2022.

As per the customs data, China’s overall exports in 2022 rose by seven per cent and imports rose by 1.1 per cent, while China’s trade surplus last year stood at $877.6 billion China’s exports increased to $3.95 trillion, decreasing from 2021's high growth of 29.9 per cent while imports increased by 1.1 per cent to $2.7 trillion, compared to the previous year's 30.1 per cent rise.

(PTI)