The Chinese authorities recognize that the trade performance of 2021 will be difficult to reproduce next year. These tensions with China, of which the United States is also a stakeholder, come on top of a less buoyant commercial situation. To the point of arousing the concern of Beijing.

With the coming economic slowdown, rising freight prices, very disrupted air traffic, the end of the year is particularly active for the European Commission in its trade defense policy vis-à-vis China. The Covid-19 pandemic has, however, given a huge boost to exports from the Middle Kingdom, which has sold medical equipment, laptops and even furniture to confined Western countries. Over one year, in October, sales abroad were still up 27%. Exports could slow as competing countries seek to recover their production capacities and as the inflation that has inflated the value of exports gradually subsides.