Donald Trump thought he could crush China with tariffs. He believed that by making Chinese goods expensive, America would win the trade war. But here we are in 2025, and the numbers tell a completely different story. China has just recorded a trade surplus of over one trillion dollars in just eleven months. Yes, you read that right – one trillion dollars. This has never happened before in history, and the year isn’t even over yet.
Now, you might wonder – didn’t Trump put heavy tariffs on Chinese goods? Didn’t Europe and Japan also create barriers? Yes, they did. Chinese exports to America have actually fallen by 29%. But somehow, China is still winning. How is this possible? The answer lies in understanding how China turned a crisis into an opportunity, and this is exactly what India needs to learn.
Let’s understand China’s strategy in simple terms. Inside China right now, people aren’t spending much money. Jobs are fewer, the property market is struggling, and people are worried about the future, so they’re saving instead of buying. This means Chinese companies are producing goods that nobody at home wants to buy. So what do they do? They export everything. They dump their surplus products into global markets at very low prices.
But the real genius is in the pricing. China has kept its currency, the Renminbi, deliberately weak. Some experts say it’s undervalued by nearly 30% compared to the Euro. What does this mean for you and me? It means that a Chinese product that should cost 100 rupees ends up costing only 70 rupees because of currency manipulation. Naturally, people across the world prefer to buy cheaper Chinese goods rather than expensive alternatives from other countries.
Take cars, for example. In 2020, China exported just over one million petrol cars. This year, they’ve already sold 4.3 million cars to the world. That’s four times more in just five years! Countries that want affordable vehicles are buying Chinese cars because they’re cheap and decent quality.
But here’s where it gets really clever. When countries like America put tariffs on finished Chinese products, China simply changed its game plan. Instead of sending complete products, they now send semi-finished goods to countries like Mexico, Vietnam, or African nations. The final assembly happens there, and then these products are shipped worldwide, including to America. The product is still Chinese, but it avoids the tariffs because technically it was “made” in another country.
Now let’s talk about India. After the border clash with China in 2020, India started campaigns to reduce dependence on Chinese goods. We saw “Boycott China” trending on social media. We heard about Atmanirbhar Bharat. But the harsh reality is that our trade with China is more imbalanced than ever before. According to Firstpost, last year India imported goods worth $113 billion from China but exported only $14 billion to them. The gap is nearly $100 billion – the biggest trade deficit India has ever had with any single country.
Why is this happening? Because simply putting up trade barriers doesn’t work. Trump tried it, and China still came out on top. India is trying it too, but our dependence on Chinese goods keeps growing. The problem is that we haven’t built the capacity to make what we need at competitive prices. We still rely on Chinese mobile phones, electronics, machinery, chemicals, and raw materials for almost everything we manufacture.
What India needs to learn from China is not how to put up walls, but how to become so efficient and competitive that the world wants to buy from us. China didn’t become an export powerhouse overnight. They invested heavily in manufacturing, kept costs low, supported their industries, made doing business easy, and most importantly, focused on making quality products at prices the world could afford.
India has potential – we have young people, growing markets, and improving infrastructure. But we need creative policymaking, not just slogans. We need to make it easier for factories to operate, reduce production costs, improve quality, and create products the world actually wants to buy. We need our industries to be competitive not just in India, but globally.
The lesson is clear. Trade wars aren’t won by building walls – they’re won by building better, cheaper, and more competitive products. China understood this. They turned Trump’s tariffs into an opportunity to find new markets and new methods. India needs to understand this too. Otherwise, the gap will keep growing, and at this rate, it will become impossible to close. The choice is ours – do we want to complain about China, or do we want to compete with China? Because in today’s global economy, only the competitive survive.
