BEIJING, April 30 -- China's services trade sustained sound growth momentum in the first quarter of this year, with travel-related services registering a rapid increase, official data showed on Tuesday.

The country's services trade totaled nearly 1.82 trillion yuan (about 256 billion U.S. dollars) in the first three months, up 14.7 percent year on year, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

Services exports came in at 744.2 billion yuan in the January-March period, rising 9.4 percent from the same period last year, and services imports jumped 18.7 percent year on year to over 1.07 trillion yuan, resulting in a deficit of 328.34 billion yuan.

Travel services saw a stellar performance in the first quarter, becoming a key pillar of China's services trade. Imports and exports of travel services totaled 480.08 billion yuan in the first quarter, a significant increase of 42.2 percent year on year.

Trade in knowledge-intensive services rose 5.6 percent year on year to 733.26 billion yuan, the data revealed.