|
CHINA> National
![]() |
|
China sees initial results in boosting domestic demand
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-05-21 11:03 BEIJING -- China's domestic demand, as the government had long wished, has started to become more of a driving force for the country's economic growth than in the past. Signs of a domestic consumption boost are apparent as people are spending more on domestic commodities, export falls, and the government plans for more consumption stimulus. Data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) last Wednesday showed that China's domestic consumption had maintained an upward trend since the beginning of the year. For example, China's retail sales rose 14.8 percent in April year on year. It was 0.1 percentage points higher than in March. Rural spending, driven by a government rebate policy on home-appliance purchases and other commodities, grew by 16.7 percent in April, which was 2.8 percentage points higher than urban growth, according to NBS.
In the housing sector, China's real-estate climate index was finally back to growth after ten months of decline. Property sales rose by 17.5 percent in acreage from a year earlier in the first four months of 2009. The growth was 9.3 percentage points faster than the first quarter level. "China's economic structure has started to enter a transforming period to a consumption-driven growth model," said Li Daokui, director of the Department of Finance at Tsinghua University. SUSTAINED DOMESTIC DEMAND GROWTH According to Li, economic growth of China's inland western and central regions, which relied less on export, had exceeded that of the coastal areas in the first quarter, reflecting a strong pull from domestic consumption and investment. Data from regional statistics bureaus had shown that western and central China accounted for nine of the 11 provincial areas that had seen double-digit economic growth year on year in the first quarter. Such growth was contrasted by coastal regions whose economy has been mainly driven by export, such as Shanghai, Zhejiang and Guangdong, gross domestic production (GDP) growth dropped to three- to- six percent. "Domestic consumption, together with fixed assets investment, had become the main forces of China's economic recovery as export continues to weaken," Li told Xinhua. His view was echoed by Zhang Liqun, a researcher with the Development Research Center of the State Council, a government think-tank, who said the continual growth in domestic consumption had provided "very strong" power for China's economy to move on. |
顺义区| 辽宁省| 栾城县| 建瓯市| 阳江市| 苍溪县| 麟游县| 崇阳县| 高青县| 望城县| 涞水县| 临澧县| 丹凤县| 墨玉县| 友谊县| 广饶县| 定远县| 新建县| 明光市| 昌吉市| 茶陵县| 锡林浩特市| 嘉兴市| 灌南县| 永州市| 晴隆县| 陕西省| 富宁县| 寻乌县| 平潭县| 万载县| 敦煌市| 临洮县| 涟源市| 塔河县| 丹寨县| 金昌市| 罗田县| 孙吴县| 阿图什市| 玛纳斯县|