China's national pension system was covering 182.42 million people by the end of September, up 4.3 percent year on year, the Ministry of Labor and Social Security said Thursday.

In the first nine months of the year, some 7.54 million people were newly covered by the pension system, a spokesperson of the ministry told Xinhua.

A total of 339.4 billion yuan (US$43 billion) were paid out to retirees between January and September, the spokesperson said, adding that no overdues have been reported so far.

The pension system received revenues totaling 403.5 billion yuan in the first nine months, an increase of 16.1 percent over the same period of 2005.

(Xinhua News Agency October 27, 2006)