Shanghai reported 87.16 billion US dollars in foreign trade in the first half of this year, up 15.5 percent year on year, according to the municipal statistics bureau.

The exports and imports of the metropolis reached 42.66 billion US dollars and 44.5 billion US dollars, up 26.4 percent and 6.6 percent, respectively.

In comparison with the same period of last year, the growth of imports was slowed down in the January-June period by 43.2 percentage points.

Local experts analyzed that the slowing-down in the pace of investment growth in the domestic markets, the sharp rise in the prices of raw materials in the international markets as well as higher import figures in the previous two years resulted in the lowering import figures in the first half of this year in the city.

Calculations showed that the city's trade deficit in the first half of this year was narrowed from 8 billion US dollars in 2004 to 1.84 billion US dollars.

Meanwhile, export of the new and high-tech products by the city in the same period was also slowed down to stand at 16 billion US dollars, up 25.9 percent year on year, 70.9 percentage points lower than the same period of last year.

Source: Xinhua