Baotou in Inner Mongolia [Photo/Baotou Daily]

Baotou, North China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region, was listed among China's Top 100 Foreign Trade Cities of 2020, which was recently released by China Customs magazine, demonstrating the city's vibrant and growing economy in foreign trade business.

The index system of China's urban foreign trade competitiveness is composed of five evaluation systems - urban foreign trade level competitiveness, structural competitiveness, benefit competitiveness, development competitiveness and potential competitiveness.

In the first half of the year, Baotou achieved a year-on-year increase of 59.4 percent in the total value of foreign trade imports and exports, ranking first in the autonomous region and accounting for 53.94 percent of the autonomous region's foreign trade.

The city recorded a foreign trade import and export value of 19.11 billion yuan ($2.99 billion) in the first three quarters of 2021, an increase of 64.23 percent over the same period last year.

Specifically, exports were 8.86 billion yuan, an increase of 74.27 percent, while imports were 10.26 billion yuan, an increase of 56.44 percent.