The first phase of the 102th Canton Fair, one of the major import and export fair in China, ended successfully on October 20. Export transaction of this autumn session reached 24.97 billion US dollars, up 4.1% from the spring session and 12.5% from the autumn session last year. The number of international buyers amounted to 123,118, down 9.5% from the spring session and 1.3% from the autumn session last year.

The present fair had better management and larger scale than the previous ones, and the number of attending countries and regions rose from 36 of the last session to 57, Mr Xu Bing, Deputy Secretary General of the Fair introduced.

By October 20, the Fair had attracted 123,118 overseas buyers from 212 countries and regions, with Asian buyers ranked the first in number, to be followed by Europe. The top three groups in terms of transaction value were Guangdong Group, with a transaction volume up 6.6% to 6.52 billion US dollars, Zhejiang Group, down 2.9% to 3.47 billion US dollars, and Jiangsu Group, up 5.5% to 2.89 billion US dollars.(From Department of Information Technology of Ministry of Commerce of China)