China's bilateral trade with the United States, the European Union and Japan, its three major trade partners, continued to fall in the first quarter, the General Administration of Customs said in a report on Monday.

The bilateral trade volume between China and the US dropped to US$62.08 billion in the first quarter, down 15.7 percent year on year. Export volume to the US declined to US$25.52 billion, falling 14.9 percent from the previous year.

China's trade surplus against the US dropped to US$28.96 billion in the first quarter, down 13 percent year on year.

In March, export to the US contracted for the fifth month in a row to US$16.45 billion, but it was the first month-on-month growth since the fourth quarter last year, according to the report.

The bilateral trade volume between China and the European Union slumped to US$75.19 billion, down 19.8 percent year on year. Export to the European Union fell to US$17.21 billion, contracting by 20.2 percent year on year.

Germany, Netherlands and the UK ranked the top three among China's European trade partners, with bilateral trade volume at US$21.63 billion, US$8.07 billion and 7.7 billion dollars, respectively.

China's trade volume with Japan slumped to US$46.07 billion, a drastic year-on-year decrease of 23.8 percent, which was 4 and 8.1 percentage points higher than decline of trade with the European Union and the United States.

(Xinhua News Agency May 12, 2009)