China's fiscal revenue up 7% in first 2 months

BEIJING - China's fiscal revenue rose 7 percent year-on-year to 3.91 trillion yuan ($582.6 billion) in the first two months of 2019, official data showed Monday.

The central government collected about 1.94 trillion yuan in fiscal revenue during the period, up 6.6 percent year-on-year, while local governments saw fiscal revenue rise 7.4 percent to around 1.97 trillion yuan, according to the Ministry of Finance (MOF).

Tax revenue went up 6.6 percent to 3.5 trillion yuan.

With the newly-revised tax exemption and deduction, revenue from individual income tax plunged by 18.1 percent year-on-year to 232.6 billion yuan. Revenue from stock trading stamp tax plummeted by 41.1 percent over the same period last year to 19.7 billion yuan, while that from tariffs dropped by 3.9 percent, MOF data showed.

Monday's data also showed China's fiscal spending expanded 14.6 percent year-on-year to 3.33 trillion yuan in the January-February period.

Social security and employment and education took the lion's share of fiscal spending, while expenditure on transport and energy conservation and environmental protection grew fastest.

China will implement an employment-first policy this year, aiming to create more than 11 million new urban jobs, according to the government work report delivered to the annual session of China's top legislature on March 5.

The country will maintain a proactive fiscal policy stance in 2019, with a higher deficit-to-GDP ratio to leave policy space to address potential risks.

The government will boost consumption via means such as steeper tax and fee cuts, and expand effective investment with increased spending on infrastructure, according to the report.