Chinese authorities announced today a recovery in the country’s economic growth rate in the first quarter (+ 4.8% year-on-year), despite the lockdown in Shanghai and other parts of the country, which have a heavy impact on activity.
The Chinese economy has been faced with “great challenges”, a high-ranking official admitted during a press conference.
Although generally cautious, official figures for China’s GDP are being closely monitored, given its weight in the global economy.
This increase was generally expected, although a group of analysts surveyed by the French Agency estimated that it would be slower (4.3%).
In the fourth quarter of 2021, China’s Gross National Product grew at 4% year-on-year.
The Chinese economy is facing “multiple trials linked to an increasingly difficult and complex global situation and the frequent outbreaks of the new coronavirus” in the Asian giant, said Fu Linghui, a spokesman for China’s National Statistics Service.
On a quarterly basis, the growth of the world’s second largest economy grew by just 1.3%, a rate lower than that of October-December (1.6%).
China, which for almost two years has managed to control the spread of the new coronavirus pandemic in its territory, is facing its worst outbreak in the last month.
Several tens of millions of Chinese were severely restricted in March in the technology metropolis of Shenzhen (south) and remain lockdown in the northeastern part of the country, the cradle of the Chinese automobile industry, and in Shanghai, the financial capital.
Unlike many other countries that have chosen to coexist with the virus and have lifted the restrictive measures, Beijing continues to pursue a SARS-CoV-2 “zero case” policy.
The measures imposed are causing major problems in transport and supply chains and have forced many companies to suspend their operations.
These difficulties are compounded by others that have plagued the Chinese economy for several months: stagnant consumption, tightening of regulatory controls in several areas, especially real estate and technology, and the uncertainties associated with the war in Ukraine.
In March, retail sales, the main indicator of household consumption, fell by 3.5% year-on-year, following their unexpected acceleration in January-February (+ 6.7% cumulatively).
Industrial production slowed to 5% year-on-year, up from 7.5% in the first two months of the year.
As for the unemployment rate, it increased by 5.8% in the first two months of the year.
This index, which is closely monitored by the government – it concerns only the inhabitants of the cities – had reached its absolute record (6.2%) in February 2020, at the peak of the pandemic, before it subsided.
Source: Capital
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