Recently, the General Administration of Customs of China released the main data for imports and exports nationwide in May this year. Among them, the import value of cosmetics and toiletries in May was 10.19 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 4.9%. From January to May 2025, cumulative imports exceeded 140,000 tons, an increase of 8.6% year-on-year; cumulative import value was 503.7 billion yuan, a decrease of 0.2% year-on-year, hitting a new low for the same period in nearly five years.
It is worth noting that whether in May this year or cumulatively from January to May, there is a trend of increasing import quantity and decreasing import value.
Comparing with the same period from the past five years, in terms of import quantity of cosmetics nationwide, although the annual year-on-year growth rate has remained above 10%, the actual import volume has declined from 187,500 tons in January-May 2021 to 130,900 tons in January-May 2024, with a slight increase to 142,100 tons in January-May 2025.
In terms of import value, the contrast is more pronounced. Except for a 33.7% growth in January-May 2021, the following four years have seen negative growth, decreasing from 649.8 billion yuan in January-May 2021 to 503.7 billion yuan in January-May 2025.
