Chinese exports to Britain surge to record £63.5bn, Official figures highlight growing dependence on Beijing

xizhimen · Feb 11, 2022

Chinese exports to Britain surge to record £63.5bn, Official figures highlight growing dependence on Beijing

Official figures highlight growing dependence on Beijing

ByLouis Ashworth
11 February 2022 • 6:40pm

Britain became more reliant on China than ever before last year, according to new figures which show that the country was responsible for a seventh of all UK imports.
China exported £63.5bn of goods to the UK in 2021, including more than £6bn each of office and telecoms tech – around £12bn more than came in from Germany and £26bn more than from the United States.

Chinese goods accounted for a seventh of total imports.

More goods were traded between Britain and the rest of the world than with the EU for the first time last year, as Brexit and demand for fuel led British businesses to look beyond the bloc.

Imports from non-EU countries were higher for the 11th consecutive month after new controls on goods coming in from Europe came into effect, according to the Office for National Statistics.

The gap between the two widened further in Europe to £4.1bn, the largest on record, as EU imports remained flat while those from the rest-of-world rose by £600m.

Ana Boata from Euler Hermes said: “Dependency on China has steadily grown over the past decade and reached a record high of 14pc of total imports in 2021. This is at the expense of trade with the EU, for which we see limited scope for a strong rebound in 2022.”

This increase in goods coming in from outside the bloc was driven mainly by rising fuel imports – including from Norway, Russia and the United States – as the UK battles an energy crisis.

The figures capture the final month before the UK introduced further customs controls on EU imports at the start of 2022.

The ONS found no evidence that companies were stockpiling in advance of the deadline.

UK trade has been disrupted by both the pandemic and new rules after the country left the EU, although it has proved hard to separate their relative impacts.
After a sharp drop in January as the Brexit deal came into effect, UK exports recovered rapidly.

However, they have plateaued since, even as other countries experienced a boom in foreign commerce amid the global rebound.

Samuel Tombs from Pantheon Economics, a consultancy, said exports “continue to stand out as an area of significant weakness” at 18pc below their 2018 level during the final quarter of last year.

The ONS’s latest survey found that two-thirds of exports and nearly four-fifths of exporters were experiencing challenges over late December and early January.
Additional paperwork, higher transportation costs and new customs duties were cited as the biggest problems.

The stats body said: “With the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and recession, it is difficult to assess the extent to which these trade movements reflect short-term trade disruption or longer-term supply chain adjustments.”