Lujiazui Photo:VCG

Lujiazui Photo:VCG

China’s economy was running on a steady development track in July, led by the rapid growths in high-tech industries and services sector, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said on Friday.

In the rest of 2025, growing market demand, the development of new quality productive forces and effective macroeconomic policies will propel China’s economic growth, despite facing external challenges, said Fu Linghui, NBS spokesperson.

Meanwhile, there remain very favorable conditions for the growth of China’s exports in the rest of the year, he said.

The solid economic performance can be seen from the marked improvement in many industrial sectors in the first seven months. Nationwide, the added value of industrial enterprises above the designated size grew by 6.3 percent year-on-year from January to July, the latest NBS data showed. In July alone, their added value ticked up by 5.7 percent year-on-year.

The added value of the equipment manufacturing sector rose by 8.4 percent year-on-year in July, while that of the high-tech manufacturing rose by 9.3 percent. 

Fu noted that the digital and intelligent transformation of industries is accelerating, which has promoted the development of many emerging industries. From January to July, the manufacturing of digital products and equipment, as well as the manufacturing of intelligent unmanned aircraft, has grown rapidly. 

The wide application of large AI models has significantly ramped up the marked demand for computing power, leading to a substantial increase in server production.

Apart from manufacturing, the services sector also expanded rapidly in July, with many modern services showing strong growth momentum. In July, the Index of Services Production grew by 5.8 percent year-on-year. Specifically, that of information transmission, software and information technology services, finance, and leasing and business services grew by 11.9 percent, 8.7 percent and 8.0 percent year-on-year, respectively. 

In July, the Business Activity Index for railway transportation, air transportation, postal service, and culture, sports and recreation stayed within the high expansion range of 60.0 percent or even above, according to the NBS.

Overall retail sales continued to grow in July, with the total retail sales of consumer goods reaching 3.878 trillion yuan ($540 billion), up by 3.7 percent year-on-year. 

“To sum up, in July, the government’s macroeconomic policies took effect and the national economy overcame the complex and volatile external environment as well as the adverse impact of extreme weather conditions at home, maintaining a stable development trajectory, which demonstrates the economy’s strong resilience and vitality,” the spokesperson noted.

Global Times