During the first four months of 2023, trade activity between Russia and China showed a strong uptrend, with the bilateral turnover exceeding $70 billion and marking a roughly 1.5x increase year over year. This expansion reflects a mix of rising demand, diversified exports, and ongoing collaboration across key sectors, as reported by the General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China via TASS. The period’s momentum demonstrated that the two economies continued to deepen their economic ties even as global conditions remained unsettled, underscoring the resilience of their trade relationship.
In the January–April window, overall bilateral trade rose 41.3%, reaching approximately $73.1 billion. China’s outbound shipments to Russia surged by about 67.2%, totaling around $33.7 billion, while Russia’s shipments to China increased by 24.8% to roughly $39.5 billion. This shift highlights how both sides benefited from complementary production capabilities, with China supplying a wide range of goods and Russia providing energy resources and related products that remained in demand amid shifting European dynamics. The solid growth pace during these months underscored the strategic alignment of Russia’s energy and raw materials with China’s manufacturing and consumer markets, helping to sustain robust cross-border commerce even in a volatile global trade environment.
On the broader Chinese trade front, the period also saw a slight contraction in the country’s overall foreign trade volume by about 1.9%, settling at around $1.94 trillion. Nonetheless, Chinese exports rose by roughly 2.5% to reach $1.12 trillion, signaling continued strength in goods shipments to global markets. At the same time, imports from other countries to China declined by about 7.3% to approximately $822.76 billion, contributing to a positive trade balance of $294.19 billion for China, an improvement of roughly 45% from the previous year. These dynamics illustrate how China managed to sustain export performance while facing softer inbound trade, reflecting a nuanced balance between domestic demand, external demand, and global supply chains that influence how trade volumes unfold across regions, including North America.
Earlier reports from RBC, drawing on Russian and international statistical agencies, noted that Russia began winter and spring 2022 with unusually large trade surpluses against a backdrop of evolving European Union, Turkey, India, and China demand patterns. This context helps explain why Russia pursued and maintained steady growth in bilateral trade with China, leveraging complementary strengths and long-standing commercial channels despite broader shifts in the global trade architecture. The ongoing data points from customs authorities and independent statistical sources together paint a picture of a carefully calibrated, multi-year trend in Sino-Russian commerce, shaped by energy dependence, infrastructure connectivity, and the strategic importance of diversified supplier networks for both sides.