China's fixed asset investment continued to grow in July as the total investment for January-July rose 31.1 percent more the same period of last year.

According to a monthly report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Wednesday, capital investment in urban areas totaled 2,711.6 billion yuan (about 330 billion US dollars) in the first seven months of the year.

The investment in real estate development surged 28.6 percent year-on-year to 605.5 billion yuan for the period.

The area of land transaction grew at merely six percent in the first seven months of the year, 3.2 percentage points faster than the first-half-year growth. In July, the area of land transaction surged 24.8 percent over one year ago.

Investment in housing totaled 506.1 percent in the first seven months. This is 26 percent more than the same period of last year.

NBS statistics show that in the first seven months of the year, capital investment in textile and garment, black metal mining and melting, non-ferrous metal mining and melting industries slowed.

On the other hand, investment in chemical, transport equipment, machinery, electricity, gas and water supply sectors increased.

Among the total financing of 3,161.4 billion yuan for capital investment in the first seven months of the year, 696.3 billion yuan were from bank loans, an increase of 25.2 percent from 2003.