The pan-Pearl-River (Zhujiang River) Delta kept a growth momentum in the first quarter of this year after achieving a 27.5 percent growth rate in import/export throughout last year.

Customs statistics showed that the nine inland provinces and autonomous region in this area--Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan--registered a total import/export value up to 101.51 billion US dollars during the first quarter, an increase of 14.2 percent over the same period of the previous year and taking up 34.4 percent of the national total. Of them, export was 56.44 billion dollars, up 22.2 percent, and import 45.07 billion dollars, up 5.7 percent.

The import/export value of the eight provinces and autonomous region other than Guangdong was 18.41 billion dollars, up 13.8 percent.

Hong Kong is the most important transit port for goods in and out of the area. During the first quarter, the nine inland provinces and autonomous region registered import/export value of 18.11 billion and 260 million dollars against Hong Kong and Macao respectively, taking up 17.8 percent and 0.3 percent of their total import/export value.

The eight provinces and autonomous region other than Guangdong bear distinct advantage in the export of their specialties. Hunan and Guangxi exported fireworks worth 17 million and 11 million dollars respectively, taking up together 58.3 percent of fireworks export of this area; Yunnan exported flue-cured tobacco worth 14 million dollars, or 56 percent of regional total; Fujian and Hainan exported 51 million and 18 million dollars of aquatic and marine products, next only to Guangdong's 99 million dollars within the region. Besides, export of steel products grew rapidly, mainly from Guangdong, Hunan, Sichuan and Yunnan.

By People's Daily Online