Foreign-invested firms are the largest contributors to China's surging foreign trade, according to statistics released on Friday by the Ministry of Commerce.

Of the country's 500 largest companies each with a foreign trade volume higher than 300 million U.S. dollars last year, 304 are foreign-invested.

There are only 141 state-owned companies and the remaining 55 are private firms.

The top 500 foreign trade companies posted 604.75 billion dollars in their aggregated imports and exports last year, representing 42.6 percent of the country's total foreign trade, up 0.4 percent over 2004.

Of the country's top 200 exporters, each with an export volume higher than 390 million dollars, 125 were foreign-invested firms.

The top 200 exporters generated 236.89 billion dollars in aggregated export volume, 31.1 percent of the country's total, up 0.5 percent from the previous year.

The statistics revealed that the 10 largest foreign trade companies mainly deal with energy resources, machinery and high-tech products. The China Petro-Chemical International Company ranks the first with a foreign trade of 34.33 billion dollars.

China's largest exporter is the Shenzhen-based Hongfujin Precision Industrial Company whose export volume was 14.47 billion US dollars last year.

Source: Xinhua