Shanghai's total import and export value reaches $195b in the first four months

Shanghai's total import and export value ticked up 1 percent year-on-year to 1.4 trillion yuan ($195 billion) during the first four months of the year, the data released by the Shanghai customs on Friday showed.

The city's total export value spiked 13.8 percent year-on-year during the monitored period to exceed 629 billion yuan.

In April alone, Shanghai saw the monthly import and export value hit a record high of about 399.4 billion yuan, up 10 percent from a year earlier. The April export value surged 17.2 percent year-on-year while that for imports grew 8.1 percent.

The combined import value of meat and cooking oil jumped 10 percent year-on-year in the first four months. Shanghai exported nearly 399 billion yuan of mechanical and electrical products over the past four months, up 2.7 percent from a year earlier.

To further boost companies' confidence and facilitate trade at a time of increasing market uncertainties, the Shanghai customs district released 33 new measures to make cross-border trade easier.

The city will conduct a pilot program to provide intelligent inspection for the packaging of exported lithium battery. The multi-modal transport services will be expanded, better connecting the goods pickup and unloading, linking air and land transportation and improving transfers in the air.

Shanghai will also experiment with a set of convenient inspection and supervision measures for imported consumer goods. Integrated facilitation measures for the cross-border trade for cosmetics can also be anticipated, according to the newly released measures.