Photo taken on Dec. 21, 2021 shows a view of the new Tiexi Plant of BMW Brilliance Automotive in Shenyang, northeast China's Liaoning Province. (Xinhua)
BEIJING, April 18 (Xinhua) -- China's economy grew 4.8 percent year on year in the first quarter (Q1) of 2022 despite challenges from an increasingly complex international environment and resurgences of COVID-19 cases at home.
Here are some highlights of the Chinese economy in Q1 as China balanced the epidemic control and economic and social development.
-- The country's gross domestic product picked up pace from a 4-percent increase in the fourth quarter last year.
-- China's value-added industrial output, an important economic indicator, went up 6.5 percent year on year in Q1.
The output of the manufacturing sector increased 6.2 percent, while the production and supply of electricity, heat, gas and water rose 6.1 percent.
-- Retail sales of consumer goods went up 3.3 percent year on year in Q1, totaling around 10.87 trillion yuan (about 1.7 trillion U.S. dollars).
Retail sales in urban areas reached 9.43 trillion yuan in Q1, up 3.2 percent year on year, while those in rural areas increased 3.5 percent year on year.
-- Fixed-asset investment jumped 9.3 percent from a year earlier to 10.49 trillion yuan in the first three months.
In Q1, fixed-asset investment from the private sector increased 8.4 percent from a year earlier to 5.96 trillion yuan, accounting for more than half of the total.
-- China's investment in property development rose 0.7 percent year on year to around 2.78 trillion yuan during the period.
-- China's surveyed urban unemployment rate stood at 5.5 percent in Q1, and a total of 2.85 million new urban jobs were created. ■
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