China took the lead in effectively controlling the epidemic in 2020, and the economy has recovered rapidly since the second half of the year, with full-year GDP growth of 2.3% year-over-year. Building on this, China's economy continues to grow strongly in 2021, with GDP growth of 18.3% year-on-year in the first quarter and 10.3% over the first quarter of 2019.
The growth of the domestic economy has driven the recovery and growth of the market demand for machine tools. From January to March 2021, the machine tool industry continued the restorative growth trend since the second half of 2020, with significant growth in all major economic indicators compared to the same period of the previous year and 2019. According to China Customs data, the first quarter of 2021 showed an overall significant growth in the import and export of machine tools, with total imports and exports increasing by 30.5% year-on-year and 9.5% compared to the first quarter of 2019.
January-March 2021, metalworking machine tools new orders increased by 90.1% year-on-year; on-hand orders increased by 28.1% year-on-year. Among them, new orders for metal cutting machine tools increased by 111.5% year-on-year, and orders on hand increased by 25.6% year-on-year; new orders for metal forming machine tools increased by 53.7% year-on-year, and orders on hand increased by 34.6% year-on-year. Compared with the same period in 2019, new orders for metalworking machine tools grew by 62.7%, with new orders for metal cutting machine tools up 74.6% and new orders for metal forming machine tools up 31.7%. Orders on hand grew on a similar trend.
