The Chinese economy grew a robust 9.4 percent in the first nine months, a spokesman for the National Bureau of Statistics announced Thursday.

Preliminary estimates show that China's gross domestic product (GDP) totaled 10.63 trillion yuan (US$1.3 trillion), a year-on-year rise of 9.4 percent, or 0.1 percentage point decline from the growth of a year earlier, said Zheng Jingping, the spokesman.

Of this total, the primary industry registered a value-added of 1.35 trillion yuan (US$166.5 billion), up 5 percent. The value-added of secondary industry totaled 6.04 trillion yuan (US$744.8 billion), up 11.1 percent, and that of the tertiary industry rose 8.1 percent to 3.23 trillion yuan (US$398.3 billion).

The economy showed a steady growth momentum with GDP growth rates standing at 9.4 percent, 9.5 percent and 9.4 percent for the first, second and third quarter, respectively, Zheng said.

(Xinhua News Agency October 20, 2005)