The 128th China Import and Export Fair, also known as the Canton Fair, is being held from October 15 to 24, and is expected to attract about 26,000 participants from more than 210 countries and regions. It is the second time that the Canton Fair has moved online this year due to the coronavirus outbreak. An employee of the organizing committee told the Global Times that last year the exhibition halls were full of products and people. This year, it’s virtual, and staff have to work day and night to keep up with the schedules of foreign participants. There are more than 60,000 online booths offering 2.358 million products, of which 691,500 are making their debuts. The scale is close to the June session, the first online Canton Fair due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Xu Bing, Spokesperson of the Canton Fair and Deputy Director General of the China Foreign Trade Center, said.

With new technologies, exhibitors and buyers can register in just three minutes, and start negotiations and procurement in 10 minutes. Panorama, 3D, virtual reality and other cutting-edge technologies are used in the virtual exhibition halls and live-streaming will enhance the experience of the buyers, according to a Tencent technician. The company provides technical support for the online Canton Fair. “In addition, robots will answer regular questions, which will reduce the need for human staff by 70%. Electronic business cards have been launched this time, allowing both parties in deals to keep in touch after the event. The Canton Fair has become a huge online trading platform,” said the technician.

Based on the scale of the fair, a barometer of China’s foreign trade, the fourth-quarter trade figures will continue to grow, Hu Qimu, Senior Fellow at the Sinosteel Economic Research Institute, told the Global Times. “With no clear bailout plan in the U.S., UK, or the eurozone in the fourth quarter, major European economies and the U.S. are expected to see a wave of layoffs, making it impossible to organize production effectively. It will on the one hand affect China’s export demand, but on the other hand, some of China’s traditional industries will get more orders, as production in the rest of the world hasn’t truly recovered. Other countries will have to rely on China’s manufacturing,” Hu added.

The Canton Fair is held in Guangzhou, one of the cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA), the closest region in China to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which is currently China’s largest trading partner. The GBA can use the Canton Fair as a link to China’s largest export market, and get support from manufacturers and traders nationwide, said Hu, as reported by the Global Times.

One of the benefits of having the Canton Fair “in the cloud” is that it saves booth rent of up to CNY300,000 otherwise required in a brick-and-mortar setting. Yi Zhe, Manager at a LED turnkey project service provider based in Shenzhen, CLT LED Display, said the cloud-based Canton Fair still has technical glitches that need to be improved, but his company believes virtual trade shows will become a “new normal” in the coming years.

In the third quarter China posted a record 10.2% increase in exports to CNY5 trillion, as foreign demand increased and domestic manufacturing activity returned back to normal. Imports were up 4.3% to CNY3.88 trillion, the General Administration of Customs (GAC) said. Exports grew for the sixth month in a row, as the third quarter saw record foreign trade volume. The expansion was supercharged by stronger exports of medical equipment, home appliances and consumer electronics. The exports of epidemic control materials such as medical equipment and drugs propped up total exports by 2.2 percentage points, while the increase in consumer electronics commerce pushed up total exports by 1.1 percentage points.

For the first seven months, China’s share in global foreign trade expanded 1 percentage point compared with the same period last year to account for 12.6% of the global total. The share of China’s exports expanded 1.1 percentage points and imports 0.8 percentage points. For the first nine months, China’s total foreign trade expanded 0.7% year-on-year to CNY23.12 trillion, recovering from a 6.4% deficit in the first quarter and continuing a consolidating trend that began in the second quarter. In line with China’s strong foreign trade performance, the IMF raised its forecast of China’s GDP growth for the year to 1.9% from 1.0% in its previous forecast in June. China’s stabilizing imports also contributed to the recovery of global trade. In the first three quarters, China’s imports of integrated circuits increased 16.6% year-on-year while grain imports grew by 20.7%. Looking at the fourth quarter, China’s exporters will still face rising headwinds from the possible worsening of the global pandemic during the coming winter season and slumping world demand, analysts said. ASEAN has remained China’s largest trading partner in the first three quarters, according to the GAC, the Global Times reports.