In the first quarter of this year, the leather, fur & related products industry operated at a slower growing pace, but the fur and its products sector maintained the fast-growing trend in last year, making great contribution to the stable operation of the entire industry.

According to related statistics, in the first quarter of this year, the sales revenue of leather, fur and related products industry in China totaled CNY 242.58 billion, up 12.9% year-on-year, improving 2 percentage points compared with the end of 2012; the profit totaled CNY 13.89 billion, up 9.3% year-on-year, down 0.7 point from the end of 2012; the export amounted to US$ 9.49 billion, up 27% year-on-year, up 17.2% percentage points over the end of 2012.

In the first three months of this year, the sales revenue of leather and fur garment increased by 32.9%; profit grew 59.5%, while export grew respectively 36.5% in quantity and 64.8% in value, far exceeding the average level of the industry. Meanwhile, the shoe-making sector exported 2.6 billion pairs of shoes, up 11.3% year-on-year, in which, the export quantity of leather shoes dropped by 0.6% while all other shoes rose 57.6%.

In the first quarter of this year, the export of leather, fur and related products industry to the United States, EU and Japan accounted for respectively 24.9%, 22.4% and 6% of the total, up 11.4%, 32.6% and 2.7% year-on-year. The export to ASEAN rose even by 108.7%, making ASEAN the third largest export market instead of Japan. With the efforts made to opening up other developing markets, emerging markets have become a new driving force for promoting the growth of foreign trade, for example, the export to Africa grew 58%.