Exports hit 130.7 billion dollars during the month as global trade perked up, bringing China's full-year export figure to 1.20 trillion dollars, according to figures from the General Administration of Customs.

Data out of Germany last week showed that China overtook Europe's biggest economy in November to become the world's top exporting nation.

The December data broke a long string stretching back to late 2008 in which monthly Chinese exports had contracted as foreign markets dried up in the global economic downturn.

State-run China Central Television quoted a top customs official as saying the figures indicated the worst was over for China's vital export sector.

"This is an extremely important turning point. Our nation's foreign trade had been falling for 13 consecutive months but is now growing," said Huang Guohua, head of the customs bureau's statistical analysis department.

"Our nation's exporters have emerged from their downslide."

Overall foreign trade -- both exports and imports -- fell 13.9 percent in 2009 to 2.21 trillion dollars, the data showed, as monthly exports fell sharply on a year-on-year basis in each of the first 10 months of the year.

But that changed in November, when exports slipped just 1.2 percent, the slowest decline of the year.

Imports for December set a new monthly record of 112 billion dollars, a rise of 55 percent year-on-year, while full-year imports came in at 1.005 trillion.

The December import record was fueled in part by a 41 percent increase in iron ore imports, the customs administration said, as China devoured foreign resources to fuel its economic boom.

The nation's politically sensitive trade surplus hit 18.4 billion dollars for the month of December, while the full-year surplus posted a rare fall to 196 billion dollars, the customs bureau said.

The 2009 trade surplus was down 34.2 percent from 2008, it said.

With China's trade data for all of 2009 now out, the nation's crowning as the 2009 export champion is expected to be confirmed when Germany releases full-year trade figures on February 9.

From January to November, Chinese exports were worth 1.07 trillion dollars. Data from the German national statistics office on Friday showed that exports from the European heavyweight came to 1.05 trillion dollars in the 11 months.

Experts have said a resurgence in Chinese trade will likely bring renewed pressure on China to let its yuan currency appreciate.

The value of the yuan, which has effectively been pegged to the US dollar since mid-2008, has been a bone of contention between Beijing and its Western trading partners, who say it keeps the currency low to boost exports.

While China has acknowledged the need to boost domestic consumption and reduce its reliance on exports and investment to drive the economy, it has so far refused to budge on its currency policy.

Premier Wen Jiabao said last month in an interview with state media that China would not yield to foreign pressure on the yuan.

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