On August 4th, the Ministry of Commerce released data showing that China's service trade will steadily grow in the first half of 2025, with a total import and export volume of 3887.26 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 8.0%. Among them, exports amounted to 1688.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 15.0%; Imports amounted to 2198.96 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.2%. The trade deficit in services was 510.66 billion yuan, a decrease of 152.21 billion yuan from the same period last year. Knowledge intensive service trade maintains growth. In the first half of the year, the import and export of knowledge intensive services reached 1.50254 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.0%. Among them, the import and export scale of other commercial services, telecommunications, computers, and information services is relatively large, with amounts of 639.1 billion yuan and 529.38 billion yuan respectively, with growth rates of 3.1% and 12.7%. The export of knowledge intensive services reached 865.04 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 7.8%; The import of knowledge intensive services reached 637.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.6%; The surplus was 227.54 billion yuan, an increase of 40.92 billion yuan compared to the same period last year. Li Xingchen, Associate Researcher at the Institute of Foreign Economic Research of the National Development and Reform Commission, believes that new forms and models of service trade such as digital culture, online education, and cross-border healthcare are accelerating their "going global". The attractiveness of China's telecommunications, computer, and information services in the international market is constantly increasing. In addition, China is continuously deepening its service industry reform, and the international recognition and market competitiveness of high-end professional services such as research and development, design, and legal consulting continue to improve. Digital trade has become a new driving force to promote the upward trend of service trade in the global value chain. In the view of Wei Xiang, a researcher at the Institute of Finance and Economics Strategy of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, with changes in industrial structure, especially the increasing proportion of information and technology businesses in the service industry, service trade is expected to become a new engine driving economic growth. In terms of growth rate, travel service exports have the fastest growth. In the first half of the year, travel services maintained rapid growth, with imports and exports reaching 1.08029 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.3%, making it the largest sector of service trade. Among them, exports increased by 68.7% year-on-year, and imports increased by 5.5% year-on-year. Experts believe that since the beginning of this year, the growth of travel services in China has been strong, thanks to the country's abundant tourism resources, improved infrastructure, and increasingly high quality of tourism services. More and more foreign tourists are coming to China for tourism. Jia Ning, Director of the International Balance of Payments Department of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, recently stated that China continues to optimize services for foreign visitors to China, expand visa facilitation, and increase the popularity of foreign travel to China. Supported by this, in recent years, China's service trade revenue has steadily expanded and expenditure has steadily increased. For the development of China's service trade in the next stage, Song Siyuan, deputy researcher at the Data Center of the Research Institute of the Ministry of Commerce, stated that in order to better respond to external risks and challenges, the development of China's service trade should be guided by mechanism innovation, create a stable and reliable trade policy environment, gather and utilize various factors and resources that are conducive to the development of service trade, continuously deepen cooperation with other trading partners, consolidate the foundation and promote innovation, improve quality, increase growth, and better play the role of stabilizing foreign trade. Zhao Jinping, Vice President of the China Association for Trade in Services and Researcher at the Foreign Economic Research Department of the Development Research Center of the State Council, suggested accelerating the cultivation of new forms of digital service trade. By establishing an international digital service trade demonstration zone, promoting the application of blockchain technology in cross-border payments and copyright transactions, and supporting cross-border e-commerce platforms to expand B2B technology services. (New Society)