(Yicai Global) Jan.31 -- In 2021, China's service trade went up 16.1 percent year on year to nearly CNY5.3 trillion (about USD831.42 billion), the Ministry of Commerce said yesterday.

Of the total, service exports reached more than CNY2.54 trillion, up 31.4 percent year on year, and service imports stood at CNY2.75 trillion, gaining 4.8 percent year on year.

The growth of service trade exports outpaced import growth by 26.6 percentage points, resulting in a 69.5-percent drop in the service trade deficit.

The service trade deficit stood at CNY211.28 billion, CNY481.65 billion less than in 2020, and the lowest since 2011.

Compared with the 2019 level, however, service trade dropped 2.2 percent, with service exports up 30 percent and service imports down 20.4 percent.

Trade in knowledge-intensive services rose last year to reach nearly CNY2.33 trillion, up 14.4 percent, year on year.

Knowledge-intensive service exports increased 18 percent to CNY1.26 trillion, while knowledge-intensive service imports rose 10.4 percent to CNY1.06 trillion.

Trade in transport services grew significantly last year following the rapid growth of trade in goods. It surged 61.2 percent to more than CNY1.68 trillion.

Trade in travel services, however, dropped 22.5 percent last year to CNY789.76 billion.

In December 2021 alone, the country's service trade registered CNY619.73 billion, up 28.6 percent, year on year.

China has taken a slew of measures to widen the opening-up of the service industry and pledged to make more efforts to promote the opening-up of trade in services to a higher level.