China’s economy “improved significantly” in the third quarter, a senior official at the state planner said on Monday, a day before the quarterly growth figures were officially released.
Economic performance in March, April and July was weighed down by “better-than-expected factors” including the external environment, Covid-19 outbreaks and extreme weather, said Zhao Chenxin, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission.
But aggregate economic activity — from factory output and investment to consumption — has continued to rise, Mr Zhao said at a briefing on the sidelines of the 20th Chinese Communist Party National Congress.
“From a global perspective, China’s economic performance is still excellent,” he said, adding that the country’s consumer inflation is low compared to that of western economies.
Mr. Zhao’s comments come a day ahead of the release of third-quarter growth data. According to a Wall Street Journal poll of 15 economists, the economy is expected to have grown 3.5% year over year in the quarter, up from the 0.4% expansion recorded in the second quarter.
But the recovery is unlikely to help China meet the 5.5% growth target set by the government earlier this year. Since gross domestic product only grew by 0.4% in the second quarter, growth in the first half of the year was only 2.5%.
According to the WSJ survey, domestic consumption, as measured by retail sales, is likely to have slowed further to 2.7% in September, from a 5.4% increase in August.
Industrial production is expected to have improved after a power crisis, growing 5.0% yoy in September from 4.2% in August. Fixed investment is expected to have grown by 6.0% yoy in January-September compared to the 5.8% pace recorded in the first eight months of the year.
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