Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has fragmented the international division of labor network, with global export trade plummeting, while China's export trade has grown more than expected against the trend. This paper uses the country-commodity trade data provided by United Nations Comtrade Database (UN Comtrade) to explore the fact that China's export grew against the trend under the shock of the pandemic. Based on the analysis of export growth drivers, it is found that China's export market on the demand side is diversified, the domestic supply chain on the supply side has the advantage of “cost performance” of products, the relative stability of the supply chain system, the advantages of the logistics system in the supply and demand connection network, which all of them made efforts from the “three-dimensional” and contributed to the contrarian growth of China's exports under the impact of the pandemic. In addition, institutional advantages have also played an irreplaceable role in the growth of export trade under the impact of the pandemic. This paper reveals the reasons for the counter - trend growth of China's export under the impact of COVID-19, which is of practical significance for stabilizing the fundamentals of China's foreign trade.
Keywords: impact of the pandemic; export growth; stabilizing export trade
