China exported US$10.349 billion of textiles in October, down 13.64 percent from September, said the Ministry of Commerce on Wednesday.

Although China's monthly textile export volume exceeded US$10 billion for the consecutive five months this year, its year-on-year growth rate has slowed down, according to the ministry.

The abolishment of the global textile quota at the beginning of this year as well as China's textile production capacity expansion led to the sustained growth of China's textile exports, but the renminbi appreciation and trade frictions with the United States and European Union have affected China's textile exports in the latter half of this year, the ministry said.

The European Union and the United States have respectively signed textile deals with China this year after tough talks, setting quotas on China's textile exports to the two markets for a couple of years.

In the first ten months of this year, China exported its textile goods to 224 overseas markets. During the ten months, 17 countries witnessed their textile imports from China exceed US$1 billion, including the United States, Japan, Russia, Germany, the Republic of Korea, Britain, Italy, United Arab Emirates, Canada, Australia, France, Spain, Singapore, the Netherlands, Panama, Saudi Arabia and India. Chinese mainland's textile exports to Hong Kong also surpassed US$1 billion.

Textile exports to most of these markets went up this year, with that to France and Spain jumping over 80 percent year on year.

From January to October, China's provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Guangdong as well as Shanghai saw their textile exports exceed US$10 billion. The textile export volume of these four regions accounts for about 70 percent of China's total textile exports.

China's exports of textile yarn, fabrics, textile goods, knitted apparel, tatting apparel and apparel accessories grew rapidly. During the period, China exported textile yarn worth US$4.154 billion, up 17.28 percent year on year; textile fabrics worth US$12.649 billion, up 17.24 percent; textile goods of US$19.516 billion, up 32.65 percent; knitted apparel US$60.835 billion, up 20.74 percent; tatting apparel US$21.702 billion, up 18.96 percent; and apparel accessories US$26.671 billion, up 24.02 percent

(Xinhua News Agency December 8, 2005)