Shanghai's economy starts the year solidly with steady 6.8 percent growth in Q1

Shanghai's economy got off to a solid start this year when it grew at a steady 6.8 percent in the first quarter of 2018.

The city's gross domestic product expanded 6.8 percent year on year to 786.34 billion yuan (US$125.06 billion) — flat from the same quarter last year, according to the Shanghai Statistics Bureau.

The services sector took up 70.3 percent of the total GDP, contributing 552.78 billion yuan — up 7 percent year on year.

The value-added industrial output rose 6 percent to 836.09 billion yuan in January to March from a year earlier.

Of the city's six key industrial sectors, the output of automobile manufacturing rose 11.6 percent and that of biomedical producers gained 16.1 percent. The output of complete equipment manufacturing and electronic information product manufacturing also rose. The production of high-quality steel manufacturing and petrochemical and fine chemicals sectors, however, fell from the same three-month period last year.

The industrial added value of strategic emerging industries in Shanghai grew 8.2 percent to 243.16 billion yuan, up 1.7 percentage points from January-March last year.

Shanghai's foreign trade from January to March grew 5.9 percent from a year earlier to 793.93 billion yuan, according to data from Shanghai Customs.

Imports were up 8.5 percent to 483.47 billion yuan while exports rose 2 percent from the first quarter of last year to  310.46 billion yuan.

The total contract value of Shanghai's foreign direct investment amounted to US$10.54 billion in January to March, with the number of contracts up 1.6 times from the same quarter a year ago to 984.

Fixed-asset investment rose 7.7 percent annually, 0.4 percentage points faster than the whole of 2017.

State-owned enterprises' FAI rose 0.6 percent to 32.12 billion yuan, while non-SOEs' investment surged 10 percent.

Infrastructure FAI jumped 15.1 percent and that in real estate development grew 4.6 percent to 90.94 billion yuan.

The Consumer Price Index, a main gauge of inflation, rose 1.8 percent in the first quarter year on year. Prices in services gained 0.2 percent from the fourth quarter of 2017 amid a consumption upgrade and rapid growth in consumer demand for services.