Momentum has slowed down in the rapid foreign trade growth in Yiwu, a city famous for its international commodity trade. According to the statistics from Jinhua Customs, the first half of this year has seen a foreign trade volume of 935 million dollars in Yiwu, an increase of 14.5% over last year, down 12.5% compared with the increase in the same period last year and 12.5% lower than the provincial average growth rate.

        According to the statistics, textile industry (mainly composed of socks and shirts), zips, and plastic ornaments remain the major export commodities. Certain traditional commodities, such as jewelry and cosmetics, have suffered a substantial negative growth in export, whereas there is a rapid growth in exports such as bottle caps and stoppers made of base metals, e.g. aluminum, bags and cases. EU, the United States and the Middle East are still the major target markets of small commodities in Yiwu markets. The United States, the United Arab Emirates, Russia, Germany and Spain rank the top five exporting countries. Those less afflicted by the subprime lending crisis, such as Germany and Spain, have seen a greater increase.