China maintains recovery despite newfound challenges

Employees of China FAW Group work on an assembly line at a factory in Changchun, Jilin province, in September. [PHOTO/CHINA DAILY]

China's economy has maintained the recovery trend in October with steady growth in industrial production and investment, while consumption was still weak amid pressures from renewed COVID-19 outbreaks, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

China's value-added industrial output, a gauge of activity in the manufacturing, mining and utilities sectors, grew by 5 percent in October from a year earlier after a 6.3 percent rise in September, figures released by the NBS showed on Tuesday.

Fixed-asset investment, a gauge of expenditures on items including infrastructure, property, machinery and equipment, increased by 5.8 percent in the January-October period year-on-year, compared with 5.9 percent rise in the first three quarters.

Retail sales, a key measurement of consumer spending, declined by 0.5 percent year-on-year in October, after the 2.5 percent year-on-year growth in September.

The surveyed urban jobless rate stood at 5.5 percent in October, flat with the previous month, according to the NBS.

The NBS said China's economy is facing pressures from a more complicated and grimmer environment, and the country will intensify its efforts to better implement the existing policies and effectively coordinate pandemic prevention and control with economic and social development in a scientific way.

More efforts will be made to expand effective demands, deepen supply-side structural reforms, keep on maintaining stability in areas such as employment, prices and market expectations and stimulate market vitality, so as to consolidate the foundation for recovery.