China's gross domestic product (GDP) grew 9.9 percent year on year to 20.163 trillion yuan (US$2.96 trillion) in the first three quarters of this year, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said on Monday.

The growth rate was 2.3 percentage points lower than the same period of last year, or 0.5 percentage points lower than the first half of this year.

The GDP growth was 10.6 percent for the first quarter, 10.1 percent for the second quarter and 9 percent for the third quarter, the bureau said.

NBS Chief Economist Yao Jingyuan told Xinhua that the GDP growth for the January-September period was still higher than the 9.8-percent average for the past three decades.

Given the ongoing global economic slowdown, China's GDP growth for the first three quarters "is a hard-earned achievement," said Yao.

"It was achieved on the basis of the current macro-control efforts," he added.

The total GDP for the January-September period included 2.18 trillion yuan generated by the primary sector, up 4.5 percent, 10.11 trillion yuan by the secondary sector (including manufacturing and construction), up 10.5 percent, and 7.87 trillion yuan by the tertiary sector (mainly services), up 10.3 percent.

The growth rates for the primary sector was 0.2 percentage points higher than the year-earlier level, but that for the secondary and tertiary sectors were 3.0 percentage points and 2.4 percentage points lower respectively.

Li Xiaochao, the NBS spokesman, noted that the 9.9 percent growth was achieved on a large economic volume.

(Xinhua News Agency October 20, 2008)