THE National Bureau of Statistics yesterday revised China's gross domestic product growth last year to 11.9 percent from 11.4 percent after corrections to service sector data.
China's economy expanded 11.9 percent to 24.95 trillion yuan (US$3.55 trillion) last year, an increase of 291.1 billion yuan from the previous calculation.
The country still remained the world's fourth-largest economy as Germany has predicted a 2.4-percent growth, which could raise its annual output to 2.4 trillion euros (US$3.8 trillion), last year. The country has yet to report last year's economic data.
China's revision reflected greater output by the service sector than it originally reported. The sector expanded 12.6 percent last year, instead of 11.4 percent previously.
China also yesterday disclosed that the nation's foreign direct investment in March jumped 39.6 percent from a year ago to US$9.28 billion, the Ministry of Commerce said.
The growth is in line with that of February's FDI which surged 38.3 percent but paled from a 110-percent expansion in January.
The number of newly established foreign firms in China fell 28.04 percent year on year in March to 2,577 as investors focused on bigger and more capital-intensive projects.
Rising FDI
In the first quarter, the FDI rose 61.26 percent to US$27.4 billion while the number of newly-approved foreign-invested firms dropped 25.26 percent to 6,949, the ministry said.
It did not elaborate on the figures. The growth rate was 49.7 percentage points higher than a year earlier..
China's FDI utilization has been rising steadily this year. The actual use of FDI in January jumped 109.78 percent from a year ago. During the next two months, it rose 39 percent.
By origin, the number of new US-funded enterprises fell 31.95 percent year on year, although their total investment soared 37.51 percent.
As for the European Union, 15 countries saw newly-approved firms fall 24.74 percent in number, although overall investment climbed 51.15 percent.
The ministry said FDI has helped China boast the largest foreign exchange reserves at US$1.65 trillion at the end of February.
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