China's service trade totaled 2.61 trillion yuan (about 377 billion U.S. dollars) during the first half of the year, up 2.6 percent year-on-year, the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) said Monday.

Service exports grew nine percent year-on-year to 933.37 billion yuan, while imports edged down 0.6 percent to 1.68 trillion yuan. The service trade deficit dropped 10.5 percent to 745.71 billion yuan in the first half.

Proportion of service trade increased

The proportion of service trade in foreign trade has increased. In the first half of the year, service trade accounted for 15.1 percent of total foreign trade, 0.5 percentage points higher than last year, said the MOFCOM.

The added value of the service industry increased by seven percent, bringing impetus to the continued stable growth of service trade.

Knowledge-intensive services stand out

In the first half of the year, the imports and exports of high value-added and high-tech services grew rapidly, with a trading volume of 892.39 billion yuan, an increase of 9.4 percent, accounting for 34.2 percent of the total import and export of services.

Industries with faster growth include telecommunications, information services and commercial services.

Exports of financial services increased by 13.9 percent, and imports increased by 43.9 percent. In June, China issued a white paper on financial services provided for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in a bid to alleviate the financing difficulties facing them.

(CGTN's Wang Hui contributed to the story.)