GUANGZHOU — Guangdong province, a manufacturing heartland and leading foreign trade player in China, reported robust trade growth in the first three quarters of 2021.

Foreign trade of the southern Chinese province totaled 6.03 trillion yuan (about $943 billion) in the January-September period, up 18.6 percent year-on-year, the provincial customs authority said on Oct 22.

Its exports grew 19.3 percent year-on-year to 3.68 trillion yuan, while imports increased 17.5 percent to 2.35 trillion yuan.

Private businesses continued to be a big contributor to Guangdong's foreign trade, registering an import and export volume of 3.43 trillion yuan in the first nine months, up 21.9 percent year-on-year and accounting for 56.9 percent of the total trade.

Foreign-funded enterprises contributed 37.7 percent of Guangdong's foreign trade.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations was Guangdong's largest trading partner in the first three quarters, with a foreign trade volume of 908.37 billion yuan, up 17.4 percent year-on-year. The province's trade with the European Union and the United States grew by over 16 percent year-on-year during the period.