China's Q1 industrial output growth slows to 9.5%

BEIJING - China's industrial value-added output growth eased to 9.5 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2013, down 2.1 percentage points from the same period last year, according to new official data.

The pace was also 0.5 percentage points slower than the full-year growth registered in 2012, the National Bureau of Statistics said in a statement on its website on Monday.

In March alone, the industrial output rose 8.9 percent year-on-year, decelerating 1 percentage point from the first two months of this year.

The March output in the industrial sector added only 0.66 percent from the level of February.

Value-added industrial output measures the final output value of industrial production, or the value of gross industrial output minus intermediate input, such as raw materials and labor costs.

In March, China's heavy industries expanded 9.1 percent year-on-year, while light industries increased 8.2 percent from a year earlier.

Analyzed by ownership, growth of State-owned enterprises faltered in March, expanding only 4.3 percent, while stock-holding companies posted the fastest growth of 11 percent, compared with 5.8 percent for collectively owned companies and 6.1 percent for overseas-funded companies.

All 41 sectors tracked by the NBS saw output growth in March, but the electricity and heating sector, which is used by many analysts as a key indicator of economic vitality, registered an output growth of only 1.4 percent.

Electricity rose 2.1 percent from a year earlier to 419.4 billion kilowatt hours in the month.

Meanwhile, steel output increased 9.2 percent year-on-year to 89.61 million metric tons in March, cement output added 6.9 percent to 186.98 million tons, while 40.83 million tons of crude oil were processed in the period, up 5.5 percent.

Also on Monday, the NBS said economic growth eased to 7.7 percent Jan-March, down from 7.9 percent in the fourth quarter but above the full-year target of 7.5 percent.