China's trade surplus up 43 percent in June

China's trade surplus rose 42.9 percent year-on-year in June as demand from emerging markets offset stagnation in the eurozone and Japan, the government said on Tuesday. Exports for June were 180.21 billion dollars, up 11.3 percent year-on-year, while imports rose 6.3 percent to reach 148.48 billion dollars, the General Administration of Customs said. This brought the surplus for June to 31.73 billion dollars, up 42.9 percent from the same month in 2011, the administration said in a statement. Customs spokesman Zheng Yuesheng said China would be able to achieve its goal of 10-percent growth in both imports and exports this year if the financial crisis in Europe did not worsen. He attributed this partly to a diversification strategy to emerging markets. "Trade growth almost stagnated with the EU, Japan and other traditional markets, but steadily grew with emerging markets," Zheng told reporters. Exports for the first six months of the year climbed 9.2 percent to 954.38 billion dollars, while imports rose 6.7 percent to 885.46 billion, according to the statement. The trade surplus for the first half was 68.92 billion dollars, up 56.4 from the same period a year earlier, the statement said.