China completes 5th national economic census

China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said on Thursday that it has completed the fifth National Economic Census, with the data revealing notable progress in areas such as promoting high-quality development, constructing a new development paradigm, modernizing the economic system, deepening supply-side structural reforms, and advancing innovation-driven growth.

Also on Thursday, the NBS announced a revised GDP figure for 2023, reaching about 129.43 trillion yuan ($17.73 trillion), up 3.37 trillion yuan, or 2.7 percent, from the preliminary figure.

With the benchmark date set for December 31, 2023, the survey covered all legal entities, industrial units, and individual businesses operating in the secondary and tertiary industries within the country, providing a comprehensive look at the scale, layout, and efficiency of these sectors, the NBS said in a statement on its website. 

In terms of the secondary industries, encompassing the industrial and construction sectors, at the end of 2023, industrial enterprises had total assets of about 201.02 trillion yuan ($27.54 trillion), up 44.3 percent from 2018, while total revenue reached 152.38 trillion yuan, up 28.6 percent from 2018, according to the NBS. 

At the end of 2023, there were 4.23 million industrial enterprises in China, a 22.7 percent increase from 2018, employing 114.28 million people, down by 0.8 percent from the previous census. 

Meanwhile, the tertiary industries, including wholesale and retail sectors, saw marked development. At the end of 2023, there were 10.19 million wholesale and retail enterprises, employing 53.25 million people, marking increases of 56.9 percent and 32.9 percent respectively since 2018, the NBS said. 

Notably, strategic emerging and high-tech industries saw significant growth. For instance, by 2023, there were 96,000 large-scale industrial enterprises engaged in strategic emerging industries, accounting for 19.5 percent of all such entities.

In the high-tech manufacturing industries, at the end of 2023, there were 53,000 major high-tech manufacturing enterprises, up 57.4 percent from 2018, accounting for 11.5 percent of all major manufacturing entities, an increase of 2 percentage points since the last census. 

Chinese enterprises have also significantly stepped up efforts in research and development (R&D). The number of industrial enterprises engaged in R&D activities in 2023 was 151,000, a 44.3 percent increase from 2018.

In terms of scientific research and technical services, the number of entities in this sector reached 2.12 million, with 17 million employees, up by 66.0 percent and 43.7 percent respectively from 2018, according to the NBS.