(ECNS) -- China's gross domestic product (GDP) grew 5.5 percent year on year in the first half (H1) of 2023, reaching 59.3 trillion yuan (about 8.3 trillion U.S. dollars), with the service sector becoming the main driving force, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed Monday.
The 5.5 percent growth rate is faster than the economic growth rate of three percent in the last whole year and 4.5 percent in the first quarter.
“The growth rate of 5.5 percent is faster than the average annual growth rate of 4.5 percent in the three years of the COVID-19 epidemic, and the economic growth is picking up,” said NBS spokesperson Fu Linghui at a press conference.
Statistics from the NBS show that the country's value-added service output went up 6.4 percent year on year in H1 and the growth rate accelerated by 1 percentage point from the pace recorded in the first quarter. Last year, the economic growth was mainly driven by industry, but in H1, the service sector also contributed a lot to the growth, with a contribution rate exceeding 60 percent.
"The service sector highlighted the economic growth of H1," said Fu. He pointed out that the full recovery of economy has created favorable conditions for the development of the service sector, such as the contact-based service industry.
Meanwhile, the increasingly active economic activities, such as people flow and logistics, have promoted the development of related service industries and Chinese residents’ frequent travel since this year has driven the economic growth in cultural performances and movie box office, he added.
Xu Hongcai, deputy director of the China Association of Policy Science's economic policy committee, said that the economic growth rate in the first half of the year was basically in line with expectations, and the driving force for economic growth was mainly the service sector, which grew rapidly.
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