China Business

Jan 6, 2006

2005 retail sales to top US$756 billion

BEIJING - The Chinese Ministry of Commerce predicts that China's total retail sales of consumer goods in 2005 will hit 6.1 trillion yuan (US$756 billion), said the Beijing-based Economic Daily January 4.

The latest bulletin from the ministry, quoted by the newspaper, said China's total retail sales of consumer goods in the first ten months of 2005 reached a historic level of 5.1 trillion yuan, a year-

on-year growth of 13%. The rapid expansion of the consumer goods sector is helping to resolve employment problems in China, said the ministry.

Statistics show that in the first ten months last year, the sectors of wholesale & retail trade and the catering trade offered additional job positions to 2.72 million people, about 30.9% of China's new jobs during that period. The ministry said that total employment in the whole consumer goods-circulating sector was around 56 million by the end of 2005, accounting for 24% of the entire service sector.

In 2005, the contradiction between supply and demand in the consumer goods circulating sector was also eased, said the ministry. Among 600 major consumer goods, 428 kinds are faced with supply surpassing demand, 71.3% of the total, according to a survey of the ministry.

The ministry said China's top 20 enterprises in the consumer goods circulating sector reported a total sales value of 437.96 billion yuan in the first ten months of 2005, soaring 26.4% over the same period of last year, with total profits hitting 5.03 billion yuan.
(Asia Pulse/XIC)

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