Chinese worker raising New Year decorations Photo: Peoples Daily

China's trade surplus surged 47.7 percent over a year earlier to reach a record $262.2 billion in 2007, the General Administration of Customs said on Friday.

The administration also pointed out the country's soaring trade surplus fell slightly in the fourth quarter last year, with imports rising and exports slowing down.

The trade surplus growth was 69.4 percent for the first three quarters of this year and up to 75 percent in 2006.

Xinhua, China's State news agency, reported that in 2007, exports rose 25.7 percent to $1.22 trillion dollars, and imports climbed 20.8 percent to $955.8 billion. 

The export growth was 1.5 percentage points lower than in 2006, while the import growth posted a gain of 0.9 percentage point.

The December trade surplus was $22.69 billion, down14.2 percent from the previous month.

The total foreign trade hit a new high of $2.17 trillion in 2007, up 23.5% from a year earlier, according to the General Administration of Customs.

Xinhua says that a report of the China Customs Statistics said the country's foreign trade registered a downward trend in October as the country's efforts to curb exports paid off.

However, it also pointed out that the impact of the US sub-prime mortgage crisis should not be overlooked.

"The hangover of the US sub-prime mortgage crisis could be a key negative factor in China's trade sector in 2008," Zhuang Jian, a senior economist of the Asian Development Bank, told Xinhua.

The United States remained China's second largest trading partner with the bilateral trade volume standing at $302.08 billion, up 15 percent compared with the same period in 2006, according to the customs administration.

The European Union was still the largest trading partner, and Japan the third largest. Trade with the EU rose 27 percent year-on-year to $356.15 billion and that with Japan reached $236.02 billion, up 13.9 percent.

The country's trade surplus for 2006 stood at $177.47 billion.