Sales volume of 1,000 national key retailers increased 24.5 percent year on year in January, said Yao Jian, spokesperson of China's Ministry of Commerce, at a regularly held press conference on February 16.

 

Yao noted that this indicates that there have been noticeable preliminary effects resulting from China's 2008 fourth quarter policy measures for expanding domestic demand and stimulating economic growth.

 

When speaking about the consumer market, Yao said that the domestic consumer goods market maintained a momentum of stable and rapid growth in 2008, and that total retail sales volume reached 10.8 trillion yuan, an increase of 21.6 percent, setting the highest record since 1996. After adjusting for inflation factors, the actual figure was an increase of 14.8 percent, up by 2.3 percentage points from 2007 and 5.8 percentage points higher than the GDP growth rate. The growth in retail sales volume is playing a major role in stimulating the economy.

 

Yao noted that market sales are experiencing relatively fast growth in early 2009 thanks to the two holidays, New Year's Day and Spring Festival. In January, 1000 of China's key retail operators posted average sales growth rate of 24.5 percent compared to the previous year, with notably higher growth in the sales of consumer goods. During the same period, auto sales in the domestic market reached 735,500 units, an increase of 4.4 percent month on month for passenger cars, showing signs of recovery for two consecutive months as a result of the government's tax cut policies. Moreover, service consumption became more and more brisk during the Spring Festival Golden Week, with noticeable revenue growth in services sectors including culture, tourism, education and telecommunications, symbolizing a transformation in consumption of China's residents from mainly consumer goods to equal consumption of consumer goods and services.

 

Yao added that in January 2009, consumer prices saw further declines, becoming generally more stable. The CPI in January increased 1 percent year on year. Although the CPI was up by 0.9 percent month on month from December 2008, it was the ninth month in a row that saw a fall in its growth rate. At the same time, as the policies issued by the central government to stimulate domestic demand gradually take effect, the prices of production goods including steel, rubber, coke and iron ore have rallied recently, with respective increases of 7.6 percent, 7.9 percent, 14.0 percent and 10.4 percent, compared with the lowest prices in the early fourth quarter of 2008. The effects of various policy measures issued by the central government since the fourth quarter of 2008 are becoming visible for the first time. –People’s Daily Online