China's Economy Drives Global Economic Growth
(PHOTO:VCG)
By Staff Reporters
Preliminary figures showed that China's 2021 GDP saw an increase of 8.1 percent compared with that of the previous year, reaching over 114 trillion RMB, said Ning Jizhe, Commissioner of the National Bureau of Statistics of China, at a press conference in Beijing on January 17.
Despite the ongoing impact of COVID-19, China's GDP growth exceeded the anticipated 6 percent. "In general, China's economy has been recovering continuously and stably in 2021, with major indexes meeting the anticipated targets," said Ning.
The uplift of China's economy also drove the growth of the world economy, with an estimated contribution rate of about 25 percent.
Increased opening up has led to new breakthroughs. In 2021, China's total volume of trade in goods surpassed 6 trillion USD for the first time, showing the highest growth rate since 2011. The import and export volumes with countries along the Belt and Road Initiative reached 11.6 trillion RMB. With 15,000 trips, the number of the China-Europe freight trains rose by 22 percent.
One of the contributing factors for the good performance of China's economy, according to Ning, was that the driving force of innovation was effectively strengthened. The total spending on research and development (R&D) went up by 14.2 percent, continuing the double-digit growth since the 13th Five -Year Plan period. The spending on R&D comprised 2.44 percent of China's GDP, and spending on basic research surged by 15.6 percent compared with that of last year, making up 6.09 percent of the total spending on R&D.
The high-quality development made in 2021 also played an important role. In particular, new achievements were made through development driven by innovation with the rapid development of the hi-tech industry. The added value of information transmission, software and the IT service industry climbed by 17.2 percent.
It was also worth noting that there was considerable progress made in energy saving and reducing energy consumption.