China's retail sales rally, consolidating economic recovery

BEIJING -- China's retail sales of consumer goods, a major indicator of the country's consumption strength, continued to see robust growth in May, providing a boost to the country's overall economic recovery.

The country's retail sales of consumer goods surged 12.7 percent year on year in May, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed Thursday.

In the January-May period, the country's retail sales of consumer goods increased 9.3 percent year on year to 18.76 trillion yuan (about 2.62 trillion U.S. dollars), according to the NBS.

"With the consumption scenarios expanding and residents' consuming propensity increasing, service-related consumption achieved rapid growth," NBS spokesperson Fu Linghui told a press conference.

From January to May, the growth rate of the box office revenue across China topped 40 percent year on year, while that of the revenue in the catering sector registered 22.6 percent.

During the five-day May Day holiday, tourism revenue reached 148.06 billion yuan, surging 128.9 percent from last year.

The trend of consumption upgrading extended, with the retail sales of gold, silver and jewelry, as well as communication equipment in May all exceeding 20 percent.

Online retail sales remained a bright spot. In the first five months, online sales of physical goods gained 11.8 percent year on year, and the growth rate was 1.4 percentage points higher than that in the January-April period.

Fu attributed the expansion in consumption to the generally improved employment situation this year, which will increase the income of urban and rural residents and strengthen their spending power, and policies to promote consumption, as well as the accelerated development of new consumption models.

Noting that the contribution rate of final consumption to the country's economic growth reached 66.6 percent, Fu said consumption is a strong driving force to consolidate economic recovery.

The consumption growth in China, however, still faces several constraints, said Fu, adding that there is room for the improvement of consumption power and people's willingness to spend money.

Efforts should be made to stabilize growth, employment and prices in the next stage and better implement consumption promotion measures, he said.

China will expand domestic demand in 2023, prioritizing the recovery and expansion of consumption, according to this year's government work report.

Fu noted that the country will take measures to expand traditional consumption and accelerate the cultivation of new consumption, as part of efforts to promote the sustained healthy development of the economy.