BEIJING — China continued to see a deficit in foreign service trade in June but the volume has narrowed, data from the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) showed on July 31.

Income from trade in services stood at $20 billion last month, while expenditure was $42.1 billion, resulting in a deficit of $22.1 billion.

The deficit retreated from the $27.6 billion seen a month earlier.

In contrast to merchandise trade, trade in services refers to the sale and delivery of intangible products such as transportation, tourism, telecommunications, construction, advertising, computing, and accounting.

China has taken steps to improve the development of trade in services, including gradually opening up the finance, education, culture, and medical treatment sectors.

The SAFE began issuing monthly data on the service trade in January 2014 to improve the transparency of balance of payments statistics. Since the start of 2015, it has also included monthly data on merchandise trade in its reports.

Last month, China saw a surplus of $50.5 billion in foreign merchandise trade.