JSPES, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Summer 2011)
pp. 139-153

China’s International Trade in High Tech Industries between 1992 and 2009

Sungwoo Kim

Northeastern University, Boston

China has successfully expanded its exports in high tech industries. At the present, the majority of the exports are processed products for foreign firms, yet China will eventually develop her own indigenous high tech products and will seriously challenge export markets of the current countries actively engaged in high tech trade. This paper analyzes China’s foreign trades between 1992 and 2009 for both total and high tech products, with detailed data from the United Nations. The trades are analyzed in terms of the individual commodities as well as trade partners. With these analyses, this paper recommends that the current countries engaged in high tech trades invest most aggressively in research and development so that the frontier of high tech industries will constantly outpace, in terms of the level as well as the variety, the challenges to be mounted by China and possibly by India.