BEIJING, April 8 -- More small businesses in China will enjoy tax breaks as part of the government's efforts to address the pressure on economic growth, authorities said Tuesday.

Any company with annual taxable income under 100,000 yuan (about 16,000 U.S. dollars) will have its business income tax halved starting from Jan. 1 this year till the end of 2016, said a joint statement of the Finance Ministry and the State Administration of Taxation (SAT) on Tuesday.

This means the tax breaks apply to more small businesses. China's State Council decided in 2011 that any company with annual taxable income under 60,000 yuan will have its business income tax halved during 2012-2015.

The news came after the cabinet announced last Wednesday to extend tax breaks for the small and micro firms by one year till the end of 2016.

The move aims to promote economic growth and creates jobs, said the statement.

Liu Shangxi, a Finance Ministry researcher, thinks of the move as an "important measure to accommodate the downward pressure on growth, maintain growth momentum and restructure the economy."

Small and micro firms serve as the foundations for continuous and steady economy growth, said a latest report by SAT.

By the end of 2013, there were about 11.7 million small and micro companies in China, accounting for 76.6 percent of the total number of firms in the country, the SAT report showed.

Taking small family businesses into account, small companies accounted for 94.2 percent of the total number and created about 150 million jobs.