**China says both exports and fell in September from a year earlier but at a slower pace than in previous months.**Exports fell 21.3% to $846.6bn (£531.4bn)over January to September, and imports were down 3.5% to $103bn.
Both declines were improvements over August, when exports contracted 23%, and imports fell 17%.
China’s trade surplus stood at $135.5bn (£85bn) for the first nine months of 2009, falling 26% compared with the same period a year ago.
The General Administration of Customs added in its statement on its website that in September alone, exports fell 15.2% from a year earlier to $115.9bn.
“Exports are improving but not so much, bearing in mind that the Lehman shock was September of last year, which created a meaningful statistical base,” Dong Tao, an economist with Credit Suisse in Hong Kong told Reuters.
"Overall, export performance will be much better in the months to come. I think it’s going to be sustainable and it’s going to accelerate.
“There are some rush orders coming to China for Christmas, so I expect probably a pretty strong rebound in November and December,” he said.
China’s Vice Minister of Commerce Zhong Shan recently said that China’s exporters were still facing a tough time.
To support exporters, China has raised value added tax rebates on exports several times in the past year, increased tax refunds and improved export credit insurance.
The central bank has also effectively halted the yuan’s rise against the dollar since July 2008.