Imports—commodities: electrical machinery and equipment, machinery and mechanical appliances, plastics, iron and steel, scientific and photograph equipment, paper and paper board (1998)
Imports—partners: Japan 20%, US 12%, Taiwan 12%, South Korea 11%,
Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore, Russia (1997)
Debt—external: $159 billion (1998 est.)
Economic aid—recipient: $6.222 billion (1995)
Currency: 1 yuan (Y) = 10 jiao
Exchange rates: yuan (Y) per US$1—8.28 (February 1999), 8.2779
(December 1998), 8.2790 (1998), 8.2898 (1997), 8.3142 (1996), 8.3514
(1995), 8.6187 (1994)
note: beginning 1 January 1994, the People's Bank of China quotes
the midpoint rate against the US dollar based on the previous day's
prevailing rate in the interbank foreign exchange market
Fiscal year: calendar year
Communications
Telephones: 105 million (1998 est.)
Telephone system: domestic and international services are
increasingly available for private use; unevenly distributed
domestic system serves principal cities, industrial centers, and all
townships
domestic: interprovincial fiber-optic trunk lines and cellular
telephone systems have been installed; a domestic satellite system
with 55 earth stations is in place
international: satellite earth stations—5 Intelsat (4 Pacific Ocean
and 1 Indian Ocean), 1 Intersputnik (Indian Ocean Region) and 1
Inmarsat (Pacific and Indian Ocean Regions); several international
fiber-optic links to Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Russia, and
Germany