Outside experts verify official statistics

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, January 20, 2004

Outside experts verify official statistics

For the first time ever, the Chinese government has invited experts to appraise the official statistics before releasing the gross domestic product (GDP) figures for 2003 Tuesday.

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For the first time ever, the Chinese government has invited experts to appraise the official statistics before releasing the gross domestic product (GDP) figures for 2003 Tuesday.

Li Deshui, head of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), said the NBS would continue to solicit opinions from various sections of society on official GDP figures to be released so as to enhance the transparency and accuracy of the statistics.

NBS figures released Tuesday show China's GDP grew by 9.1 percent year-on-year in 2003, much higher than the estimates of international analysts at around 8 percent.

On Jan. 17, the NBS invited officials from the macro-economic departments of the government and scholars from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing University and People's University to assess the 2003 GDP figures. The officials and scholars reviewed the calculating methods of the NBS and gave unanimous approval of the official figures, Li said.

However, the experts also pointed out aspects that need to be improved in the statistical system and put forward suggestions on addressing the problems.

This was the first time that the NBS had released figures in this way and follows a reform of the GDP statistics composing and release system at the beginning of this year.

China has adopted a new method of calculating per capita GDP invarious areas of the country, using the actual number of local residents, instead of the number on household registrations, as the base for calculation. This method is in line with the ever increasing mobility of Chinese population, since traditional household registration fell far short of reflecting the real number of local residents, especially in the prosperous east of the country, where millions of rural laborers are rushing to the cities to find jobs.

From the beginning of this year, China will no longer release monthly GDP figures.

Since it joined the General Data Distribution System (GDDS) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in April 2002, China has greatly improved its statistics system in terms of GDP, industrialand agricultural growth, financial and fiscal statistics and international income and payment.

Besides reforming the GDP composing and release system, China will also adopt new methods of calculating the growth rate of the industrial and agricultural sectors this year. It will also implement new classification standards for sectors of the nationaleconomy.

Source: Xinhua

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