China's national economy maintains steady progress during first six months of 2024

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By Liu Zhiqiang (People's Daily) 08:33, July 19, 2024

Photo shows a brightly lit and bustling container terminal of Taicang Port, east China's Jiangsu province, July 9. (People's Daily Online/Yuan Xinyu)

China's national economy was generally stable with steady progress in the first half of 2024, according to data released by China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on July 15.

According to preliminary estimates, the country's gross domestic product (GDP) in the first half of 2024 reached around 61.68 trillion yuan (about $8.5 trillion), up by 5 percent year on year at constant price.

Since the beginning of this year, the momentum of world economic growth is sluggish, and effective domestic demand in the Chinese market remains insufficient, leading to increasing difficulties and challenges in current economic operations.

Against the global backdrop, the Chinese economy still delivered a sound performance.

In the first quarter of this year, China's GDP growth rate outpaced that of the United States, the Eurozone, and Japan. Considering the situations home and abroad in the second quarter, it is expected that China's economic growth rate will maintain its leading position in the first half of the year, and the country will remain an important engine and stabilizer for the world economy.

Despite facing both overall and structural pressures, China's economic growth, especially in the labor-intensive service sector, has continued to recover, with the employment situation remaining generally stable during the first half of this year.

The country has witnessed improvement in the relationship between market supply and demand, while the price level maintained moderate growth during the period.

Besides, the country's foreign trade in goods reached a new high in the first half of this year, with the goods trade volume reaching 21.2 trillion yuan and export products holding solid competitive advantages.

In the meantime, steady progress has been made in industrial transformation and upgrading, showing a growing trend toward innovation-driven and green development.

In the first half of this year, the proportion of the value-added industrial output of China's high-tech manufacturing companies above the designated size, namely industrial firms with an annual main business revenue of at least 20 million yuan, in the total value-added industrial output of the country's industrial enterprises above the designated size rose to 15.8 percent, up 0.6 percentage points from that of the first quarter.

Tourists have fun in Jiangbulake scenic spot in Qitai county, Changji Hui autonomous prefecture, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, July 14. (People's Daily Online/Tao Weiming)

The country's manufacturers of intelligent and green new products, such as integrated circuits, service robots, new energy vehicles (NEVs), and solar cells performed impressively during the first six months of this year, maintaining double-digit growth in production.

New technologies like big data and artificial intelligence have created new consumption scenarios, while new consumption models such as livestreaming e-commerce and instant delivery continued to emerge, driving an 8.8-percent year-on-year increase in online retail sales of physical goods during the first half of this year.

Meanwhile, the combined power output of hydropower, nuclear power, wind power, and solar power companies above the designated size increased by 13.4 percent year on year, accounting for a higher share in the total power output of the country's industrial enterprises above the designated size. Besides, the energy consumption per unit of GDP in China continued to decline.

While maintaining stable economic growth, authorities from different regions in China have made continuous efforts to create a new pattern of development, adjust industrial structures, and improve development quality and efficiency in the first half of this year, striving to stimulate the internal impetus and innovation vitality of businesses, an NBS spokesperson said at a press conference.

These efforts have provided steady and sound momentum for the country's high-quality development, the spokesperson said.

The leading role of scientific and technological innovation has been strengthened, nurturing new quality productive forces for China.

In the first half of this year, the value-added industrial output of China's high-tech manufacturing companies above the designated size increased by 8.7 percent year on year, while the modern service industry, with typical fields including information transmission, software, and information technology services, maintained double-digit growth in value-added industrial output.