Foreign trade minister Emma Bonino is satisfied for the data issued by Istat (national statistics institute) on the value of regions' s exports. "All the regions have positive data for their exports" she says. "We register this change and Italy is rising its head and I believe it is important stressing that the GDP has risen by 1.7 pct in the last year while exports have risen by 7 pct while the domestic demand has risen around 1 pct. It is an essentially export-led recovery" the minister says. According to the minister it is important this growth happens in an homogeneous way especially towards strategic partners like Germany (up 6.1 pct) or the new markets like China (up 23 pct) and Russia (up 21 pct) and the substantial recovery in the Mercosur area (up 14 pct) while there is still a crisis in the exports to Japan (down 1.4 pct). This market after a boom in the 90s does not attract the Italian products anymore.