China's foreign trade started under pressure in the first half of the year and stepped out of a clear "upward line".

The growth rate of import and exports in the first two months decreased by 1.2% year-on-year, and the growth rate turned from negative to positive in the first quarter, increased to 2.4% in the first four months, and further rebounded to 2.5% in the first five months, and the cumulative growth rate of imports and exports rose month by month. Scholars here believe that many factors such as export exceeding expectations, optimizing trade structure and effective policies jointly support this positive performance.

However, when the "second half", China's foreign trade pressure cannot be ignored. Chen Jianwei, professor at the National Institute of Opening-up at the University of International Business and Economics, pointed out in an interview with China News Service that the United States' repeated swings and extremely uncertain trade policies will still be the biggest variable.

The latest "2025 Third Quarter Economic and Financial Outlook Report" released by the Bank of China mentioned that there is uncertainty in the process of tariff negotiations between the United States and major trading partners, and the tariff game in major economies is still evolving, which may have spillover effects on China's exports.

Under the impact of changes in the trade environment, the momentum of global economic growth has weakened, and the slowdown in foreign demand has further compressed China's export space. In addition, factors such as the increase in the base also put pressure on export growth in the second half of the year.

With multiple challenges combined, how can China's foreign trade further "stabilize its position"?

Chen Jianwei believes that China's advantages in product structure and trade networks help resist external shocks. On the one hand, the structure of export products has been continuously optimized, and the trend of upgrading to high-value-added and high-tech products is obvious. China's competitive advantages in high-tech, new energy and other fields are expected to provide new impetus for exports.

On the other hand, the pace of market diversification is still accelerating. China's trade exchanges with emerging and developing economies are becoming increasingly frequent, which will contribute more to foreign trade.

Since this year, Chinese officials have also been actively implementing policies, starting from improving the level of openness, improving the foreign trade environment, and enhancing the competitiveness of enterprises, in order to provide new support for the development of foreign trade.

Promote the comprehensive pilot program of expanding the opening up of the service industry and implement the strategy of improving the free trade pilot zones.……A series of high-level institutional opening-up measures to deal with external uncertainties with the certainty of expanding opening up. The cross-border e-commerce comprehensive pilot zone will be expanded again, and the innovative development of new trade formats will further promote the quality improvement and upgrading of foreign trade.

Accelerate the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, and the "two legs" of enterprises' foreign trade and domestic sales will walk more steadily. The Ministry of Commerce recently stated that it will help more enterprises integrate domestic and foreign trade operations and improve the level of integrated development. More than 330 foreign trade quality China Tours will be held in the second half of the year.

The China Council for the Promotion of International Trade mentioned earlier that under a package of policies to stabilize foreign trade, foreign trade enterprises are opening up incremental markets, expanding domestic sales markets, and linking to enhance supply chain resilience, and overcoming current challenges. Industry analysts said that as policy effects gradually emerge, China's foreign trade vitality is expected to further enhance.

Some positive changes have emerged. A recent HSBC Group trade prospect survey for global companies shows that global companies generally respond to new trade changes by adjusting their trade strategies, including reassessing the importance of major markets to their trade growth. Among the target markets that plan to increase trade exchanges, China received the highest proportion of companies interviewed.

Cheng Shi, chief economist at ICBC International, believes that although there is still uncertainty in the external environment, China will explore and shape new comparative advantages and growth space by relying on the advantages of the entire industrial chain and the optimization and upgrading of product and market structure. China's exports' status and added value content in the global value chain will steadily increase, providing solid support for steady improvement in foreign trade quality.