China slightly trimmed its final 2016 Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figure after scaling back an initial estimate of the services sector, but kept the annual GDP growth rate unchanged at 6.7 per cent.
The National Bureau of Statistics revised the final 2016 GDP to 74.36 trillion yuan ($11.47 trillion), down 54.2 billion yuan from the preliminary number, reports Reuters.
The 2016 growth rate of the world’s second-biggest economy remains unchanged at 6.7 per cent, the statistics bureau said in a statement on Friday.
Final data from the bureau shows the services sector grew 7.7 per cent in 2016 to 38.3 trillion yuan.
The sector, which accounts for half of China’s GDP, expanded 7.8 per cent in the bureau’s initial estimate to 38.4 trillion yuan.
The revisions were mainly due to small cuts in the bureau’s estimates for the size of the financial and tech sectors, which grew 4.5 per cent and 18.1 per cent in the final numbers, respectively, down from 5.7 per cent and 22.2 per cent in the earlier data release.
Growth estimates for manufacturing, agriculture, construction and real estate remain unchanged.
China’s 2016 GDP grew at its slowest pace in more than a quarter of a century as the government pushed through painful structural reforms in the economy.
GDP is expected to have expanded 6.8 per cent in 2017, exceeding the government’s target of around 6.5 per cent. But growth will likely slow to 6.4 per cent this year, economists say.
Property investment and construction are expected to lose steam as more cities try to curb surging housing prices, while a government campaign against riskier lending pushes up borrowing costs and a crackdown on pollution hurts some factories.
The government will keep its GDP growth target at “around 6.5 per cent” in this year, policy sources told Reuters.
