China Economy
China Economic Statistics from Official Sources

To receive detailed version of our China economic statistics report or China business news summary, please subscribe to our China Business News Weekly Report.

China Economic Statistics (June 20 to June 26, 2005)
China Economic Statistics (June 27 to July 3, 2005)
China Economic Statistics (Most Recent Sample)

June 20 to June 26, 2005

China’s state-owned and non-state industrial enterprises each with annual sales volume exceeding five million yuan realized a combined profit of 496.8 billion yuan in the first five months of this year, up 15.8% year-on-year, according to a reported released by the National Bureau of Statistics. The profits of the state-owned and state share-holding enterprises stood at 249.1 billion yuan, up 13.6% year-on-year; that of collective enterprises, 18.3 billion yuan, up 29.3%; that of enterprises funded by foreign investors or those from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, 137.2 billion yuan, down 4.3%; and that of private enterprises, 53.9 billion yuan, up 32.6%. By sector, the top five profit makers are petroleum mining, iron and steel, coal, chemicals and nonferrous metal industries. While oil refining and coking industries incurred a net loss of 1.03 billion yuan in the first five months of the year. The profits of building materials industry declined by 31.3% and that of power industry dropped 18.3%. Taxes and duties turned in by large-scale totaled 407.2 billion yuan, up 19.5% year-on-year. This includes 252.5 billion yuan of tax and duties turned in by the state-owned or state share-holding enterprises, a rise of 16.9% year-on-year. The amount of losses suffered by large-scale industrial enterprises came to 91.7 billion yuan in the period, up 56.1% year-on-year. The amount of loss suffered by state-owned and state share-holding enterprises was 46.5 billion yuan, up 77.5% year-on-year.

The per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of the Chinese capital Beijing reached 4,300 US dollars in 2004, up 11% from 2003. The city's per capita GDP is expected to exceed 6,000 dollars by 2008, indicating that the city has entered a rapid development era.

China is likely to be short of 3.2 million tons of cotton in the 2005/06 crop year, according to Shi Jianwei, standing vice chairman of China Cotton Association. The growing area of cotton in the country is estimated to drop 10% and the total output is expected to reach 5.76 million tons in the crop year. Meanwhile, China’s spinning volume is expected to increase one million tons this year, which will need 700,000 tons more cotton. The domestic cotton consumption is likely to hover around 8.85 million tons.

China’s fiberboard export volume has expanded sharply this year amid rising price. According to China Customs statistics, the export volume reached 262,600 cubic meters in the first four months of this year, a surge of 424% over the 50,060 cubic meters for the same period last year. The four-month export value amounted to 98.35 million US dollars, up 5.5-fold from the 17.84 million US dollars in the same period of last year. This means the average unit export price rose 5.1%, from 356.36 US dollars to 374.55 US dollars per cubic meter. Thanks to strong domestic demand, China’s fiberboard industry has developed rapidly in recent years. The country’s fiberboard output hit 15.6046 million cubic meters in 2004, a hefty increase of 11.2833 million cubic meters or 36.3% over 2003.

The number of phone subscribers in China reached a record of 692 million at the end of May, according to latest figures released by the Ministry of Information Industry (MII) on June 21. This is a net rise of 44.778 million in the first five months this year over the end of last year, said MII in its press release. The number of mobile phone subscribers rose 23.724 million in the first five months, making the cell phone users totaling 358 millions at the end of May.

China’s machine building industry scored a trade deficit of 5.5 billion US dollars in the first four months of this year, dropping sharply by 13.293 billion US dollars or 70.73% as compared with the same 2004 period. Such a big fall in the trade deficit has never occurred over the past few years.

China’s output of chemical fibers grew 6.01% to 4,691,800 tons in the first four months of this year, 18,600 tons more than in the same period of last year.

For the January-May period, China exported 30.789 million tons of coal, a decrease of 6.35 million tons or 17.1% from the same period of last year. The pace of decrease has been faster all the way this year, from 7.96% in January to 10.3% in the first quarter, 14.1% in the first four months and 17.1% in the first five months. While the export decreased, the country’s coal import has increased quickly. According to customs statistics, China’s coal import reached 7.28 million tons in the first four months, an increase of 2.435 million tons or nearly 50% year on year. Of the total was 1.184 million tons of power coal, 2.471 million tons of coking coal, and 3.625 million tons of anthracite.

For the January-May period, China processed 121.003 million tons of crude oil, up 8.3% year on year, which included 22.161 million tons of gasoline, up 3.4%; 44.751 million tons of diesel, up 10.4%; 4.17 million tons of kerosene, up 10%; and 9.778 million tons of fuel oil, up 11.4%. The aforesaid figures indicate that the diesel demand in China has far outgrown the gasoline demand this year, particularly in the busy season of farming. Besides, slower growth in the total crude oil processing volume and the output of main oil products in May than in the January-May period implies that the growth of the country’s demand for oil products is slowing down.

China's unemployment rate in 2004 was 4.2%, the first drop for several years. About 12 million Chinese urban residents found new jobs last year.

China's investment in urban fixed assets, a major engine driving China's economy, grew 26.4% in the first five months of this year, a rate that analysts say would help the economy expand on a fast, stable track.

China’s investment in real estate development grew 24.3% in the first five months of this year, as against 25.9% in the first four months.

China has become a major supplier of the world's merchandise as approximately 60 billion US dollars of goods are to be purchased this year by multinationals from China.

In the period of January-May, China's total energy output reached 669.741 million tons to the equivalent of standard coal, up 9.4% year on year. Of the amount, crude oil output reached 74.809 million tons, up 5%; natural gas output reached 20.07 billion cubic meters, up 19.2%; raw coal output reached 677.664 million tons, up 8.9%; and electricity output reached 925.48 billion kWh, up 13.4%.

China will import 24.5 million tons of soybean in the 2004-05 fiscal year, a 45% growth compared with the figure in the 2003-04 fiscal year, according to China State Grain and Oil Information Center. China imported 16.9 million tons of soybean in the 2003-04 fiscal year.

China will incur a grain shortfall of nearly 25 billion kilograms in 2005, according to a forecast made by Deputy Director of the State Grain Bureau Zeng Liying. Zeng predicted that the country’s grain output in 2005 will keep at the same level as or increase slightly over that in 2004. Meanwhile, the domestic grain consumption, which has increased steadily at an annual rate of nearly 1% in recent years, will exceed 490 billion kilograms this year. According to statistics from the National Bureau of Statistics, China’s grain output stood at 469.47 billion kilograms in 2004, up from 430.668 billion kilograms in 2003. The 38.8 billion kg increase was the largest annual increase in history.

China’s investment in real estate development increased 24.3% in the first five months of this year, indicating a slowdown of the growth as compared with the 25.9% increase in the first four months, according to statistics from a report issued by the National Bureau of Statistics on June 16.