Investment in China falls further

BEIJING - Agence France-Presse

Foreign direct investment (FDI) in China continued to fall in September, the government said on Oct. 19, owing to persistent weakness in the global economy and a slowdown in China.

Investment from overseas declined by 6.8 percent from a year earlier to $8.43 billion last month, the commerce ministry said.

The decline continued a downward trend stretching back to November, with the exception of May, when FDI eked out a marginal gain of 0.05 percent.

The government has blamed the slump on the slowdown in global economic growth, the prolonged European debt crisis and rising costs and weak demand at home. Data on Oct. 18 showed the world’s second-largest economy has slowed for seven consecutive quarters, expanding 7.4 percent in the three months ended September 30, its worst performance since the first quarter of 2009.

For the first nine months of the year, foreign firms invested $83.4 billion in factories and other projects in China, down 3.8 percent from the same period a year ago, the ministry said.