The country’s trade with Russia this year has exceeded $200 billion, and makers of cars and trucks are the big winners.

The country’s trade with Russia this year has exceeded $200 billion, and makers of cars and trucks are the big winners.

On China’s snowy border with Russia, a dealership that sells trucks has seen its sales double in the past year thanks to Russian customers. China’s exports to its neighbor are so strong that Chinese construction workers built warehouses and 20-story office towers at the border this summer.

The border town Heihe is a microcosm of China’s ever closer economic relationship with Russia. China is profiting from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has led Russia to switch from the West to China for purchases of everything from cars to computer chips.

Russia, in turn, has sold oil and natural gas to China at deep discounts. Russian chocolates, sausages and other consumer goods have become plentiful in Chinese supermarkets. Trade between Russia and China surpassed $200 billion in the first 11 months of this year, a level the countries had not expected to reach until 2024.

Russia’s war in Ukraine has also gotten an image boost from China. State media disseminates a steady diet of Russian propaganda in China and around the world. Russia is so popular in China that social media influencers flock to Harbin, the capital of China’s northernmost province in the east, Heilongjiang, to pose in Russian garb in front of a former Russian cathedral there.

  • naturalgasbad@lemmy.caEnglish
    51·
    11 months ago

    In October 2023, the increase in China’s year-by-year exports to Russia was explained primarily by an increase in product exports in Computers ($226M or 108%), Telephones ($220M or 50.3%), and Cars ($134M or 142%). In October 2023, the increase in China’s year-by-year imports  from Russia was explained primarily by an increase in product imports  in Crude Petroleum ($1.74B or 69.8%), Coal Briquettes ($444M or 193%), and Refined Copper ($279M or 191%).

    In October 2023, the increase in China’s year-by-year exports to Ukraine was explained primarily by an increase in product exports in Computers ($29M or 198%), Pesticides ($25M or 59.2%), and Electric Generating Sets ($21.6M or 2.86k%). In October 2023, the decrease in China’s year-by-year imports from Ukraine was explained primarily by an decrease in product imports in Barley ($-52.5M or -73.7%), Iron Ore ($-23.6M or -7.64%), and Other Vegetable Residues ($-15.7M or -15.5%).

    China’s making a killing selling computers to both sides. Unfortunately, China’s primary export to Ukraine (telecommunications equipment) is no longer viable if Ukraine wants to receive Western funding and China’s primary imports from Ukraine (agricultural products, iron ore) aren’t exactly easy to export during wartime.