Workers operate a cropper at a workshop of Lovol Heavy Industry Co Ltd in Weifang, Shandong province. [Photo/Xinhua]

Sector's output increases by 6.9 percent in the first half of 2017

China's industrial economy has maintained a momentum of steady and sound growth in the first half of the year as industrial output increased 6.9 percent on a year-on-year basis, the best performance in the past three years.

The growth rate is 0.9 percentage points higher than that in the same period last year, and the performance of enterprises continued to improve, with the main business income and profits growing by 13.5 percent and 22.7 percent in the first five months, said the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology on Tuesday.

"We estimate the industrial economy will maintain steady growth in the second half as the favorable factors have accumulated, especially those facilitated by the supply-side structural reform," said Zheng Lixin, spokesman for the ministry.

Zheng said the ministry will increase its efforts to promote private investment and technical upgrading in industrial sectors, as well as push forward the establishment of a national manufacturing innovation center and smart manufacturing demonstration areas.

"We will boost the development of entrepreneurship and innovation platforms for manufacturing, and pay attention to the new and emerging sectors, such as big data, artificial intelligence and industrial internet."

The output of the manufacturing sector increased 7.4 percent in the first half, 0.5 percentage points faster than the same period last year, ministry data showed. And the output and the investment of the high-end manufacturing sector increased by 13.1 percent and 21.5 percent respectively in the first six months.

"We have been promoting the key projects related to the Made in China 2025 strategy. the C919, the first homegrown large passenger aircraft made its successful flight, and the first domestic aircraft carriers was successfully launched," said Zhang Feng, general engineer of the ministry.

Zhang said the electronic and equipment manufacturing industries were leading the growth of industrial sectors as the output of the two sectors grew by 13.9 percent and 10.9 percent respectively in the first half.

Zhu Sendi, a special consultant for the China Machinery Industry Federation, said: "The manufacturing sector has made a great contribution to the recovery of the real economy. Moreover, the integration of manufacturing sector with internet, artificial intelligence, the internet of things has deepened, which drives the economy's steady growth."

Zhu added the industrial economy will maintain a growth rate of between 6 percent and 7 percent in the second half.

Moreover, work on cutting overcapacity in the iron and steel sector accelerated with 84.8 percent of the yearly capacity-cutting target achieved in the first five months. The task of wiping out outdated steel production capacity was completed at the end of June.

The country aims to curtail steel production capacity by around 50 million metric tons and coal by at least 150 million tons this year.