Intermediate items are inputs used to supply a closing product. Suppose textiles to make a coat, metals to make a automobile, and laptop chips to make an iPhone.
And as a analysis report printed final week reveals, tracing the movement of intermediate items may also result in insights about altering commerce relationships between international locations and the diploma to which they’re depending on one another.
One stunning revelation from the report, printed by the Asia-based, international commerce centered nonprofit Hinrich Basis, is that China is turning into depending on Taiwan for intermediate items.
China is the world’s largest importer and exporter of intermediate items, and Taiwan makes up the biggest share of China’s intermediate good imports. And Taiwan’s share is rising: In 2022, it accounted for 14% of China’s intermediate good imports, up from 12.2% in 2018.
“Regardless of escalating geopolitical tensions, China is more and more reliant on Taiwan for its inputs… partly pushed by increased demand for superior semiconductor merchandise through the pandemic,” wrote Thang Nguyen-Quoc, the report’s writer and lead economist at Oxford Economics.
Over the identical interval, China has decreased its imports of intermediate items from South Korea and Japan. Each these international locations noticed their share fall essentially the most amongst China’s high 15 sources of intermediate items imports. South Korea now accounts for 10% of China’s intermediate items purchases from overseas, down from 12.7% in 2018.
Concurrently China reduces its reliance on its East Asian neighbours for intermediate items, it’s leaning extra on Vietnam and Indonesia for the inputs. Each these international locations noticed their share of China’s intermediate good imports rise by over 1% between 2018 and 2022. Partially, that is pushed by Chinese language companies increasing manufacturing to Southeast Asia.
