BEIJING, April 19 (Xinhua) — China posted a 4.8 percent year-on-year economic growth in the first quarter of the year. Despite the short-term downward pressure from some uncertainties beyond expectations, the country still sees some favorable conditions to secure a steady economic expansion this year.
Fu Linghui, spokesperson of the National Bureau of Statistics, has spelled out the challenges facing the world’s second largest economy and its solutions at a press conference on Monday.
Check out the highlights from the press conference and the spokesperson’s comments on the current situations and future prospects.
— China’s gross domestic product in Q1 picked up pace from a 4-percent increase in the fourth quarter last year.
— The country’s value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, went up 6.5 percent year on year in Q1.
— The output of the manufacturing sector increased 6.2 percent, while the production and supply of electricity, heat, gas and water rose 6.1 percent.
— Retail sales of consumer goods went up 3.3 percent year on year in Q1, totaling around 10.87 trillion yuan (about 1.7 trillion U.S. dollars).
Retail sales in urban areas reached 9.43 trillion yuan in Q1, up 3.2 percent year on year, while those in rural areas increased 3.5 percent year on year.
— Fixed-asset investment jumped 9.3 percent from a year earlier to 10.49 trillion yuan in the first three months.
In Q1, fixed-asset investment from the private sector increased 8.4 percent from a year earlier to 5.96 trillion yuan, accounting for more than half of the total.
— China’s investment in property development rose 0.7 percent year on year to around 2.78 trillion yuan during the period.
— China’s surveyed urban unemployment rate stood at 5.5 percent in Q1, and a total of 2.85 million new urban jobs were created.