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Container ship in front of Quingdao
Photo: Chinatopix / AP
At the end of December 2020, the European Union and China signed a historic investment agreement.
However, as current figures from the statistics agency Eurostat show, economic cooperation was already closer than ever back then.
In the shadow of the corona crisis, China replaced the USA as the EU's most important trading partner for the first time in 2020.
The volume of trade with the People's Republic last year amounted to 586 billion euros, with the USA it was 555 billion euros.
Despite the corona crisis, trade in China increased significantly, and German carmakers in particular were able to absorb their corona slump thanks to business with the Far East and recently presented surprisingly good figures.
According to Eurostat, EU exports rose by 2.2 percent to 202.5 billion euros.
Imports from the People's Republic increased by 5.6 percent to 383.5 billion euros.
EU trade volume in 2020
Imports from the USA (in billion €) |
Imports from China (in billion €) |
Exports to the USA (in billion €) |
Exports to China (in billion €) |
202.0 (-13.2% compared to 2019) |
383.5 (+ 5.6% compared to 2019) |
353.0 (-8.2% compared to 2019) |
202.5 (+ 2.2% compared to 2019) |
Source: Eurostat, February 2021
China's economy had recovered from the corona crisis much faster than that of the United States thanks to success in containing the spread of the virus.
In addition, the former US President Donald Trump had not only imposed punitive tariffs on China, but also on certain imports from the EU.
The EU then imposed billions in counter-tariffs.
Trade with Great Britain collapses by 13 percent
Last year, in light of these developments, EU exports to the United States fell by 8.2 percent to 353 billion euros.
At the same time, imports from the USA fell by 13.2 percent to 202 billion euros.
The EU's trade surplus with the USA remained practically unchanged compared to the previous year at almost 151 billion euros.
Overall, the corona crisis left deep marks on the EU trade balance.
In total, the 27 EU countries exported goods worth 1.93 trillion euros abroad last year.
This was a decrease of 9.4 percent compared to 2019. Imports fell by 11.6 percent to 1.71 trillion euros.
After Brexit, trade with the former EU member Great Britain also fell significantly.
Imports and exports fell by a good 13 percent each - although the United Kingdom was still part of the EU internal market and the customs union until the end of 2020.
With just under 445 billion euros, Great Britain was the third largest EU trading partner after China and the USA in 2020 - ahead of Switzerland, Russia and Turkey.
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apr / AFP
