China has become the biggest winner in global trade

During the COVID-19 outbreak, exports of CoVID-19-related products surged, helping China become the biggest winner in global trade, western media said.

According to a report on the website of The Spanish economist on December 14, nearly half of the countries in the world are fighting the second wave of COVID-19, and the eurozone and other regions are again in economic contraction due to the second wave of COVID-19. Meanwhile, After two quarters of positive growth, China's economy began to take off on its own.

China is now recovering through the positive contribution of the various components of GDP. China took off at the worst of the COVID-19 crisis, helped in part by a surge in Chinese exports of medical products. Covid-19-related exports have helped China return to growth, and the momentum has clearly established.

The Bank of Spain published a column on Wednesday outlining the revealing data. Between February and July this year, China's figures related to global trade in medical products changed from a deficit of $800m to a surplus of $36bn.

The surge in exports of medical supplies may explain why China's merchandise trade surplus rose 64 per cent over the same period. What happens to the rest of the world when China exports a lot of medical equipment? Imports of medical equipment from developed countries have soared in response to the COVID-19 epidemic.

While this data can be interpreted in many ways, the fact is that the rapid recovery of China's production structure has made the fight against the epidemic better -- or at least safer. Had China not been able to produce these items (masks, protective suits, medical equipment, etc.), perhaps no other country would have been able to produce medical supplies on such a large scale in such a short period of time during the most difficult months of the epidemic, leading to a shortage of basic supplies to combat the epidemic.

"In contrast, the us trade in medical supplies fell by about 20 per cent, resulting in a 2.2 percentage point increase in the growth rate of the US merchandise trade deficit between February and July (the EU trade in medical supplies fell by about 10.5 per cent, resulting in a 6 percentage point increase in the EU merchandise trade deficit over the same period)," the Bank of Spain wrote.

In the case of Spain, imports of medical products also far exceeded exports in the first nine months of the year, contributing to a 55% rise in the sector's deficit to 6.9 billion euros ($8.4 billion), equivalent to nearly 62% of Spain's trade deficit (up from 19% in 2019).