Data source Official website of the Ministry of Commerce of the People's Republic of China
The Chinese animated film "Nezha: The Devil Child's Trouble" topped the global animated film box office list; the AI big model DeepSeek ranks among the top in the mobile application download rankings in multiple markets around the world... This is a vivid portrayal of the booming development of China's service trade.
Data from the Ministry of Commerce shows that my country's total service import and export volume reached 7.5 trillion yuan in 2024, an increase of 14.4% year-on-year. The scale of service trade exceeded US$1 trillion for the first time, setting a new record high. my country's service trade has achieved remarkable rapid growth, demonstrating the vitality and resilience of economic development, and behind it is the coordinated efforts of multiple fields.
New momentum for service trade continues to be released. On China's service trade report card in 2024, travel services grew the fastest, with annual imports and exports reaching 2051.15 billion yuan, an increase of 38.1%, making it the largest area of service trade. With the continuous optimization of the transit visa-free policy, "China Travel" (China Travel) has become a traffic responsibility. The active tourism market has driven the continuous upgrading of services in the fields of hotels, catering, transportation, finance, etc., further meeting the personalized and diversified needs of domestic and foreign tourists.
The structure of service trade is gradually optimized. Knowledge-intensive service trade has maintained growth, among which personal cultural and entertainment services, telecommunications and computers and information services have performed well. For example, the domestic game "Black Myth: Wukong" became a hit in the global game market as soon as it was launched, and online literature, online dramas, and online games became the "new three" of cultural outreach. With the application of technologies such as cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence, and other technologies, industries such as culture, entertainment, and sports are deeply integrated with the digital economy, and new business forms and models such as online broadcasting and immersive experience are constantly emerging, injecting new impetus into the growth of service trade.
Accelerating the development of service trade is an inevitable requirement for expanding high-level opening up to the outside world and cultivating new momentum for foreign trade development. In 2024, my country established a negative list management system for cross-border service trade nationwide for the first time; the General Office of the State Council issued the "Opinions on Promoting the High-Quality Development of Service Trade with High-level Openness", laying a solid foundation for deepening the high-quality development of service trade.
Under the wave of global digitalization, intelligence and green transformation, my country's service trade has huge potential for development. Next, we must continue to promote institutional opening up of service trade, establish and improve the management system for cross-border service trade negative list, give full play to the leading role of the open platform to the outside world, strengthen the docking of rules and regulation coordination, and improve the standardization level of service trade. Promote innovative development in key areas, including enhancing international transportation service capabilities, enhancing international competitiveness of travel services, supporting the development of professional service trade, encouraging the export of traditional advantageous services, and promoting the integrated development of service trade and goods trade. (Author: Ji Yajiao)
