China's foreign trade continued to decline in February as the result of weak global demand and seasonal factors, data released yesterday by the General Administration of Customs showed.

Exports lost 20.6 percent from a year earlier to 821.8 billion yuan (US$126 billion), down from the fall of 6.6 percent in January.

In comparison, and improving on January's contraction of 14.4 percent, imports were down 8 percent to 612.3 billion yuan.

February's trade surplus thus landed at 209.5 billion yuan, compared with January's 406.2 billion yuan surplus.

"China's disappointing exports in February reflected weakening global trade," said Liu Ligang, chief economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group.

"While yearly changes of China's trade data are usually distorted by the Chinese New Year, exports fell deeper than expected in January and February combined, suggesting that China's external profile has worsened."

In the first two months of the year, China's exports declined 13.1 percent year on year to 1.96 trillion yuan. Together with an 11.8 percent decline in imports, worth 1.35 trillion yuan, China's trade fell 12.6 percent in January and February.

The trade surplus in the first two months was 15.9 percent down on the previous year at 615.9 billion yuan.

"China has to brave an expected weak global demand this year and try hard to stabilize its trade," the National Bureau of Statistics said in a report on Monday, suggesting that the acceleration of the "One Belt, One Road" initiative should be one of the solutions to address the challenges ahead.

"The world may continue to see sluggish global demand this year due to feeble economic growth, and it will pose a threat to the stability of China's exports," the bureau said.

"At the same time, Chinese exporters have to face rising operational costs and more restraints on environment and resource-related industries. Together with continued low commodity prices that put a curb on China's imports, they will make it hard for China to sustain its trade growth," it added.

The government has not set a specific trade growth target this year, only saying China's trade growth should be better than the global average.

Last year as a whole, China's trade contracted and missed its annual target for the fourth consecutive year. The trade value in 2015 landed at 24.59 trillion yuan, down 7 percent year on year. That compared to the target of a 6 percent increase, exports edging down 1.8 percent and imports slumping 13.2 percent.

The European Union remained China's largest trading partner in the first two months with a trade value of 516 billion yuan. It was followed by the United States and the ASEAN countries, which shipped goods worth 471 billion yuan and 398 billion yuan, respectively.

Meanwhile, private traders reported business down 7.3 percent to 1.29 trillion yuan, better than the average and accounting for 38.8 percent of the total. Foreign trade involving Chinese state-owned enterprises lost 21.4 percent year on year in the first two months.

The statistics bureau is due to release other key activity data for the first two months, including inflation, industrial production and retail sales, later this week.