DUBLIN, Aug. 18 (Xinhua) -- China replaced Switzerland to become the 6th largest goods export market for Ireland in the first half of 2019, according to the latest trade figures released by Ireland's national statistics bureau CSO.
In the January-June period, Ireland exported a total of 4.13 billion euros (about 4.6 billion U.S. dollars) worth of goods to China, up by 1.66 billion euros or 67 percent compared with the same period last year.
In the first half of last year, China was the eighth largest goods export market for Ireland, ranking behind Switzerland and France.
China is now the largest goods export market for Ireland in Asia and also the third largest market for the Irish agri-food exports in the world, according to the CSO.
The top five markets for the Irish goods exports in the first half of this year were the United States, Belgium, Britain, Germany and the Netherlands, according to the CSO.
The CSO figures also showed that Ireland imported a total of 2.45 billion euros worth of goods from China in the first half of 2019, up by 178 million euros or nearly 8 percent year-on-year. (1 euro=1.109 U.S. dollars)
