BEIJING: China’s retail sales of consumer goods went up 2.7% year-on-year to nearly 3.78 trillion yuan (about US$528.82 billion) in July, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Thursday.

The growth rate was 0.7 percentage points higher than that posted in June, state news agency Xinhua reported, citing NBS fugures.

Last month, retail sales in urban areas came in at about 3.27 trillion yuan, up 2.4%t year-on-year, with the corresponding figure for rural areas reaching 506.6 billion yuan, up 4.6% year-on-year, the NBS said.

The country’s total catering revenue reached 440.3 billion yuan in July, increasing 3% year-on-year.

During the first seven months, retail sales rose 3.5 percent year-on-year to over 27.37 trillion yuan.

Source : Emirates News Agency