China's retail sales up 5.8 pct in Q1

BEIJING, April 18 (Xinhua) -- China's retail sales of consumer goods went up 5.8 percent year on year in the first quarter of this year, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Tuesday.

In March alone, retail sales jumped 10.6 percent year on year, data from the NBS showed.

Retail sales in urban areas reached nearly 3.29 trillion yuan (about 478 billion U.S. dollars) last month, up 10.7 percent year on year, while those in rural areas increased 10 percent year on year.

In March, retail sales of goods rose 9.1 percent from a year ago to about 3.41 trillion yuan, while catering revenue hit 370.7 billion yuan, surging 26.3 percent year on year.

The country's retail sales of consumer goods totaled around 11.49 trillion yuan in Q1, the NBS said.

Online consumption remained a bright spot, with online retail sales rising 8.6 percent year on year to reach about 3.29 trillion yuan in the first three months.

Since the beginning of this year, overall consumption has shown recovery momentum, with service consumption rebounding significantly, goods sales increasing steadily, online and offline consumption growing faster, and people's propensity to consume picking up, said NBS spokesperson Fu Linghui at a press conference.

The country will spare no effort to increase personal income, actively provide high-quality supply, effectively combine expanding consumption with supply-side structural reform, and unleash consumption potential, Fu added.

Tuesday's data also showed that China's gross domestic product grew 4.5 percent year on year in the first quarter of 2023.