China Heads for Balanced Development Among RegionsFollowing are facts and figures about the economic development in different regions of China in the Ninth Five-year Plan period (1996-2000), provided by the State Development Planning Commission.The gross domestic product (GDP) of western China rose by an annual average of 9.77 percent from 1996 to 1999, while that of the central China up 10.1 percent, and that for eastern China, up 10.34 percent. In the Ninth Five-year Plan period, 13 provinces and cities in the central and western regions have their economic growth rate higher than the national average, as against 8 such provinces and cities in the Eighth Five-Year Plan period. Investment in fixed assets in the central and western China accounted for 38.8 percent of the national total in 1999, up from 34.7 percent in 1996. The growth rate of export volume in the central region stood at 31.96 percent in the first six months of this year, higher than eastern region's 27.8 percent. The growth rate of export in the west also reached 27 percent. |
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