China has said its economic growth slowed in the second quarter of the year, as massive stimulus spending was scaled back and moves to rein in soaring property prices started to bite.
Gross domestic product in the world's third-largest economy maintained double-digit growth for the third quarter in a row, expanding at an annual rate of 10.3% in the three months to June, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
The latest figures add to mounting evidence that the Chinese economy is losing steam, although Beijing has so far shown no intention of reversing tightening policies. 'Generally speaking, the economy is running well,' NBS spokesman Sheng Laiyun told reporters.
Sheng said the moderate slowdown in growth in the second quarter would help prevent the economy from overheating.
The second quarter figure marked a slowdown from the blistering 11.9% in Q1 and the 10.7% in the last three months of 2009. China has introduced a range of measures to cool the red-hot economy.
Analysts said economic growth was expected to slip to single digits in the second half, but dismissed the idea of any serious troubles in the short term.
The closely watched consumer price index, the main gauge of inflation, rose at an annual rate of 2.9% in June alone, compared with 3.1% in the previous month, the statistics bureau said. The slowdown in inflation added to mounting evidence that the government's measures to avert economic overheating were kicking in.
China's fixed asset investment in urban areas, a measure of government spending on infrastructure and a key driver of the economy, rose 25.5% in the first half from the same period last year, the government said. Industrial output from the country's millions of factories and workshops increased 17.6% year-on-year in the first half, while retail sales jumped 18.2%.
