Export of Mobile Phones to China Increased 41 times

Export of mobile phone to China increased 41 times.

The main reason is the increase in the number of mobile phone users in China. The number of the users is more than 120 million people. China took over US in July of the last year and has kept number one position of the usage of mobile phone in the world.

Another cause is that Korean mobile phones such as Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, etc are excellent in function and design. So they satisfy Chinese consumers and the export of mobile phones increase sharply.

The trading dispute on garlic between China and Korea in year 2001 squeezed the export of mobile phones by 27% in the first half of the last year. That is one of reasons for the increase in the export of mobile phones dramatically in the first half of this year.

According to the yearly export of mobile phones to China; 1.47 million dollars (increased by 259% compared to the previous year) in 1996, 9.67 million dollars (560%) in1997, 14.8 million dollars (53%) in 1998, 41.35 million dollars (179%) in 1999, 14.39 million dollars (-65%) in 2000 and 99.48 million dollars (591%) in 2001. The trend has increased except the year 2000 of Garlic trading dispute.

The amount of export in the first half of this year is three time of the amount of the last year and 30 times of the amount of year 1997.

Therefore, Yum Jin Chun a manager of Samsung Electronics talked “ the export of mobile phones to China is restricted by other reason, the negative affect on Korea economy will be extraordinary.

The total export of mobile phones in the first half of this year was 4.145 billion dollars and increased by 42.6% compared to the same period of the last year. According to national classification, exports to US (1.368 billion dollars) ranked first followed by ones to Hong Kong (584 million dollars), and to China.

In terms of garlic, Korea imported 15.44 million dollars from China in 1998, 15.29 million dollars in 1999 and somewhat decreased 9.11 million dollars due to trading dispute in 2000 and 15.51 million dollars in 2001. The import in the first half of this year increased by 3%(3.76 million dollars).

Kwang-Hyun Kim kkh@donga.com