China's economy recovers with strong momentum during holidays

China's economy has recovered with strong growth momentum across diverse industries during the past National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holiday.

Statistics from the Ministry of Commerce indicate China's sales volume for key retail and catering enterprises reached 1.6 trillion yuan ($238.38 billion) from Oct 1 to 8, with the average daily sales volume increasing by 4.9 percent compared with last year's National Day golden week.

To stimulate consumers' enthusiasm to spend, a variety of sales activities were promoted and a large amount of subsidies and vouchers for automotives, home appliances, and food and beverages were released.

The recovery of consumption drives the growth of the express delivery business. Data from the State Post Bureau of China shows from Oct 1 to 8, the national postal express industry collected 1.82 billion parcels, up 53.42 percent year-on-year.

With accelerated integration of online and offline consumption, the country's postal express business has been maintained at a high growth range of above 30 percent since February, when China's express parcel volume grew from negative to positive, the State Post Bureau said.

As people started to leave their homes under the managed pandemic situation, cinemas welcomed a boom during the past holidays. As of 11:59 pm Oct 8, the 2020 National Day box office reached 3.92 billion yuan, which was the second-largest National Day box office in China's film industry, according to China's Box Office app of the Office of the National Film Industry Development Special Fund Management Committee.

As COVID-19 has come under control in the country, more people have started to resume travel. During the eight-day holiday, the country received a total of 637 million trips by domestic tourists, with domestic tourism revenue reaching 466.56 billion yuan, according to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

On the last day of the eight-day holiday, the national railways ushered in the peak of return passenger flow. On Oct 8, the national railways expected to see 13 million passenger trips, with 1,234 additional passenger trains, China Railway said.

From Sept 30 to Oct 7, the national railways have transported more than 10 million passengers for eight consecutive days, according to China Railway.

During the eight-day holiday, South China's Hainan recorded 1.04 billion yuan in offshore duty-free shopping, 146,800 tourist trips and 998,900 products, up 148.7 percent, 43.9 percent and 97.2 percent year-on-year, respectively, according to the General Administration of Customs.

Starting from July 1, Hainan increased its annual tax-free shopping quota from 30,000 yuan to 100,000 yuan per person, and the range of duty-free goods has also expanded from 38 categories to 45, with the previous tax-free limit of 8,000 yuan for a single product lifted.

Data from the Civil Aviation Administration of China showed the country witnessed a total of 13.26 million passenger trips in the period of Oct 1-8, with average daily passenger traffic rebounding to 91.07 percent of the National Day holiday in 2019.

The number of actual flights across the country reached 117,327 between Oct 1 and 8, and the average daily flight volume recovered to 89.7 percent of the 2019 National Day holiday, according to the Civil Aviation Administration of China.