BEIJING -- China's insurance industry is offering better support for economic development with generally controllable risks, the country's top insurance regulator said on Thursday.

In the first half of this year, premium income of life insurance firms rose by 6 percent year on year to 2 trillion yuan (about $286 billion), said Wang Xuwen, an official with the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC).

As of the end of last month, total assets of life insurers stood at 18.6 trillion yuan, up by 9.6 percent from the start of this year.

To help combat the COVID-19 epidemic, over 1,400 products from some 70 life insurers extended insurance coverage for their consumers without extra premiums as of the end of May, he said.

Property insurance firms also saw stable growth with their premium income up by 7.6 percent year on year to 721.7 billion yuan in the first six months.

Compensation expenses of these firms came in at 335.39 billion yuan in the same period, climbing by 3.5 percent from a year ago, according to the CBIRC.