People walk past a closed shop near London Waterloo train station in London, Britain, on April 9, 2021. Photo:Xinhua

The British Chambers of Commerce in China said on Wednesday that dialogue is significant for the UK and China to address their differences and harness areas of common interest, as China has become the UK's biggest single import market.

The data mirrors a sound business foundation between the two countries amid some political turbulence, and experts warned that "a small country in Europe" is sacrificing the interests of trade cooperation with China, which is very short-sighted. 

According to the UK's Office for National Statistics, China for the first time has replaced Germany as Britain's biggest single import market, partly driven by demand for Chinese textiles used in making face masks and PPE.

In the first quarter of 2021, goods from China accounted for 16.1 percent of total UK imports, an increase of 65.6 percent compared with the first quarter of 2018.

Chinese observers said the data partly reflects the reality that China is leading the way in global pandemic controls, leading to a stable domestic supply chain that could produce goods for overseas markets when many factories in other countries were locked down by the coronavirus.

The slow recovery of EU economies due to repeated waves of the pandemic is also hindering trade between Britain and the EU, which boosted the growth of British imports from China, analysts said. 

In an earlier interview with the Global Times, Julian MacCormac, country director for China from UK-based Rolls-Royce Plc, said that the company's global suppliers had been battered by the pandemic, and last year orders were reduced by half, including a significant reduction in volume from China, "but there has been no operation disruption caused by Chinese suppliers."

The chamber also said on Wednesday that although differences may exist, "the prospects for UK-China trade are positive," citing data that showed UK-China trade hit 79 billion pounds ($111.9 billion) in 2020. 

This was a decrease of only 8 percent - far less than the drop in overall UK foreign trade of 17 percent between 2019 and 2020, the chamber said. 

"UK-China relations have seen extraordinary shifts in the past year. Some quarters of (the UK) Parliament have expressed a desire to reduce bilateral engagement. However, dialogue is crucial if we are to address our differences and harness areas of common interest," the chamber added. 

Chinese experts said that the post-Brexit UK faces a dilemma of being marginalized in Europe, and the country worries about becoming out of touch with the European market. Trade with China is no doubt bringing practical benefits to it. 

"The economic and trade foundation of China and Britain is still solid, although there is some turbulence, reading from the trade data," Cui Hongjian, director of the Department of European Studies at the China Institute of International Studies, told the Global Times on Wednesday. 

"Political factors are like wind and rain, and both sides need to maintain stability of their trade. 

"In comparison, some small European countries such as Lithuania are sacrificing the interests of economic and trade cooperation with China. Such behavior is short-sighted, and will take away opportunities for their own development," Cui said. 

Lithuania announced over the weekend that it has withdrawn from the "17+1" cooperation mechanism between China and Central and Eastern Europe Countries, as the Baltic country is pressured by the US on security and ideology issues.

Lithuania has dropped out of the "17+1" cooperation mechanism for "political purposes", and the country even urged other EU countries to abandon the initiative, Politico reported earlier.