The import and export volume of Qingdao, a coastal city in East China's Shandong province, reached 733.53 billion yuan ($101.23 billion) in the first 10 months of this year, a year-on-year increase of 7 percent, which was 6.97 and 4.2 percentage points higher than that of the country and the province, according to statistics from Qingdao Customs.

Specifically, exports reached 396.59 billion yuan, an increase of 2.4 percent, while imports hit 336.94 billion yuan, an increase of 13 percent. The city's foreign trade accounted for 27.3 percent of the province's total value, an increase of 1.1 percentage points.

Of the 15 sub-provincial cities in the country, Qingdao was ranked fifth after Shenzhen of Guangdong province, Ningbo in Zhejiang province, Guangdong's capital city Guangzhou and Xiamen, Fujian province.

Private enterprises led the way in import and export growth, generating a total import and export value of 519.48 billion yuan, up by 13.2 percent and accounting for 70.8 percent of the total import and export value. During the same period, the import and export of foreign-invested enterprises was 136.38 billion yuan, an increase of 4.7 percent.

Imports and exports to ASEAN, the United States, and the European Union continued to grow, up 15.9 percent, 4.4 percent and 5.9 percent respectively. During the same period, imports and exports to countries involved in the Belt and Road Initiative also increased 7.9 percent.