China's FDI inflow falls for second month

Foreign direct investment (FDI) into China fell for the second consecutive month in July as global economic woes continued to weigh heavily.

The FDI the country drew last month dropped 8.7 percent from a year earlier to 7.58 billion U.S. dollars, the Ministry of Commerce said Thursday.

This brought the total FDI inflow for the first seven months of the year to 66.67 billion U.S. dollars, down 3.6 percent year on year, the ministry's spokesman Shen Danyang said.

Investment from the debt-plagued European Union dropped 2.7 percent year on year to 3.97 billion U.S. dollars in the January-July period, Shen said.

In the first half of the year, investment from the EU, China's largest trade partner, edged up 1 percent from a year ago.

In the first seven months, China attracted 1.96 billion U.S. dollars in FDI from the United States, up 1 percent year on year, he said.