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China’s economy weakens as GDP in Q3 declines to 4.9 per cent
Beijing: China’s GDP grew by 4.9 per cent in the third quarter, down from 7.9 per cent in the second, confirming the slowdown of the world’s second-largest economy which was under pressure from the crisis-hit property sector, curbs on energy and tardy recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Early to recover from the coronavirus pandemic, China’s economy in the first few months this year staged impressive recovery but caught up in numerous headwinds, including a property sector slump, power crisis, increasingly weak consumer sentiment and soaring raw material costs.
Its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the third quarter (Q3) grew 4.9 per cent year on year, slower than the growth of 18.3 per cent in Q1 and 7.9 per cent in Q2. The Q3 belied surveys of predicting five per cent growth.
Releasing the Q3 data, spokesman of the National Bureau of Statics (NBS) Fu Linghui said that consumption contributed around 64.8 per cent to China’s economic growth in the first three quarters of the year.
“We must note that the current uncertainties in the international environment are mounting and the domestic economic recovery is still unstable and uneven,” Fu said.
“The overall national economy maintained the recovery momentum in the first three quarters… however, we must note that the current uncertainties in the international environment are mounting, and the domestic economic recovery is still unstable and uneven,” the Hong Kong-based South China Morning quoted Fu as saying.
According to the official data, China’s retail sales of consumer goods went up 16.4 per cent year on year in the first three quarters this year.
The country’s retail sales of consumer goods totalled around 31.8 trillion yuan (about USD 4.9 trillion) in January-September period as per the data.
China’s value-added industrial output went up 11.8 per cent year on year in the first three quarters, while fixed-asset investment went up 7.3 per cent year on year during the period.
The country’s surveyed urban unemployment rate stood at 4.9 per cent in September, 0.5 percentage points lower than the same period last year.
