BEIJING, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- China's top 500 companies achieved a net profit nearly double their U.S. counterparts in 2009, freshly boosting China's rapid economic expansion in the run-up to the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.
A survey published jointly by the China Enterprise Confederation and the China Enterprise Directors Association on September 6 showed that the net margins of China's top 500 registered 170.6 billion U.S. dollars compared to 98.9 billion U.S. dollars of the American top 500.
This is partly thanks Chinese enterprises suffering a lighter assault during the global financial crisis but the overall performance is mainly attributed to substantial growth in China's economy as a whole.
Here are the facts and figures of China's economic development during past 60 years.
GDP
-- China's gross domestic product (GDP) surpassed 30 trillion yuan (3.86 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2008, 77 times more than in 1952 after deducting the price-rise factor. It accounted for 27.2 percent of GDP of the United States, ranking third in the world.
-- China's GDP in 1960 was 145.7 billion yuan, roughly equal to Japan, but lagged far behind in 1977 when Japan's economy was more than three times bigger than China's. However, China's GDP made up78.6 percent of Japan's in 2008 and many scholars predicated that the country would surpass Japan in 2009 to become the second largest economy in the world.
-- China's per capita GDP amounted to 2,770 U.S. dollars, turning from a low-income country to a lower-middle-income one in accordance with World Bank standards.
INDUSTRIAL STRUCTURE
China's industrial structure is undergoing change as it develops from an agricultural country to an industrial one.
-- The proportion of primary industry in GDP dropped from 51 percent to 11.3 percent while secondary industry climbed from 20.8percent to 48.6 percent, and tertiary industry from 28.2 percent to 40.1 percent.
-- China's urban residents accounted for 10.6 percent of the total population immediately after 1949 when rural-to-urban mobility was rather rigid. Since then China's urbanization has been speeding up. The urban proportion increased to 45.7 percent in 2008, and urban and rural areas became more integrated in the country's economic and social development.
POPULATION AND FOOD SUPPLY
With its large population, China's cultivated land, fresh water and energy resources are relatively lacking. Plus, a weak ecological environment and labor quality sometimes puts further strain on the country's economic development.
-- China has a population of 1.328 billion, one-fifth of the world's total. The family planning policy implemented by the government in the 1970s helped reduce ongoing totals by more than 400 million people, resulting in a four-year delay for the advent of the planet's 6 billion population day. Population control has relieve the pressures on natural resources and job markets.
-- China's total grain output was 113 million tonnes in 1949, or 209 kilograms a head per year. In 2008, the grain output increased by 3.7 times that of 1949, reaching 529 million tonnes, the highest in the world.
--China's cereal, meat and cotton output are all the largest in the world.
--China's grain reserve in 2008 doubled the world's average, ensuring the country's capacity to solve the problem of food supply.
ENERGY PRODUCTION
Energy is the bottleneck of industrial development. China's energy self-sufficiency rate has exceeded 90 percent, according to the National Bureau of Statistics in 2008. China has a multi-layered energy supply system covering coal, electricity, petroleum and gas and renewable resources.
-- China became the second largest oil refiner in 2007. In 2008,the country's oil production totaled 189.728 million tonnes, 1581 times than that in 1949.
-- China's energy consumption is going green. The coal consumption dropped from 95 percent in 1952 to 68.7 percent in 2008 while the oil consumption rose from 3.37 percent in 1952 to 18 percent in 2008. The figure for natural gas increase from 0.2 percent to 3.8 percent, hydro energy, nuclear and wind power from 1.61 percent to 9.5 percent.
FOREIGN TRADE
-- China's foreign exports and imports registered only 1.14 billion U.S. dollars in 1950, making up less than one percent of the global total trade volume. In 2008, the country's total foreign trade volume reached 2.5616 trillion U.S. dollars, making up 8.86 percent of the global total, and making China the world's third largest trader.
-- By the end of 2008, accumulated outward direct investment from non-financial sectors had added up to 141.8 billion U.S. dollars. Foreign project contracts are being carried out in more than 190 countries, to talling 263 billion U.S. dollars in terms of turnover. As many as 4.62 million Chinese are now working overseas.
LIFE AND CULTURE
-- China's online population numbered 338 million as of June 30. China leads the world in netizen quantity, broadband use and national top-level domain registry.
-- Foreign students in China climbed from 1,236 in 1978 to 223,500 in 2008, increasing nearly 180 times.
-- China has set up 305 Confucius Institutes and classes in 78countries, attracting around 130,000 registered students.
PROBLEMS AND CHALLENGES
-- The country's task to keep 1.8 billion mu bottom line is tough. China's cultivated land decreased by 124 million mu (8.27 million hectares) to 1.827 billion mu (121.8 million hectares).
-- In 2009, China heightened its poverty line, marked according to per capita annual net income, to 1,196 yuan (175 U.S. dollars),which brought the country's impoverished population to 40.07 million.
--It is hard work to bridge income discrepancies, development gaps between rural and urban areas and between poor and rich areas. China's urban residents earned 1.86 times more than farmers in 1988, but 3.33 times more than farmers in 2007. And the gap has widened still in recent years.
China is anticipating embracing another brisk 60 years, by giving much impetus to economic, cultural and ecological development and establishing closer ties with the international community.
