The People's Bank of China, or the central bank, is urging further substantial efforts to alleviate the heavily unbalanced development of the country's economy.

In a report released here Monday on the execution of monetary policy in the third quarter, the bank cautioned against four major imbalances, namely the imbalance between investment and consumption; urban and rural development; regional development; and development of different industrial lines.

According to the report, the gap between increase rates for investment and consumption has further widened as figures show that retail sales rose 8.6 percent year-on-year in the previous three quarters in comparison with the 30.5 percent year-on-year growth in investment on fixed assets.

Urban development far exceeded the development in rural areas and per-capita income for urban residents was much higher than their rural counterparts, noted the report.

Half of the workforce, who engaged in agricultural production, contributed to only 15.4 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in year 2002.

The report acknowledged that the pace of development in China's eastern areas is much faster than in the mid-western regions. It cited figures to prove that both east-central and central-west GDP gaps had widened from 1999 to 2002.

In 2002, per-capita GDP in China's east region reached 16,490 yuan (US$1,987), more than double the national average. However, the figures for the central and western regions stood at 12 percent and 30 percent below the average.

The unbalanced growth of different industrial lines was mainly caused by repetitive construction covering the production of traditional products like iron, steel, cement and automobiles and also irrational development of real estate projects, said the report.

Moreover, the report warned against excessive reliance on new industries like electronic information, software development, new materials and pharmaceuticals.

(Xinhua News Agency October 28, 2003)