China's macro-economic policies drive consumption, investment growth: authorities

China's macro-economic policies, both existing and new, have continued to play an effective role in boosting consumption and driving investment growth in the country, Sheng Laiyun, deputy director of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), said on Wednesday.

In the first quarter, the total retail sales of consumer goods grew by 4.6 percent year on year, 1.1 percentage point higher than the average growth rate of the whole of last year, Sheng said at a press conference in Beijing.

Retail sales of goods saw particularly robust growth, driven by preferential policies encouraging trade-ins and equipment upgrades, with products like electric bicycles, smartphones, tablets and smart watches seeing notably high sales growth, he stated.

Service consumption also registered accelerated growth, with retail sales of services growing by five percent in the first quarter, surpassing the growth rate of goods retail sales in the same period by 0.4 percentage point, the deputy director pointed out.

"Consumption is closely tied to income. To vigorously boost consumption, we need to enhance spending capacity. Moving forward, we will focus on stabilizing employment, increasing incomes and reducing burdens to improve spending power. We will work to significantly increase the supply of quality products and services for consumption, continuously unlock consumption potential, keep optimizing the consumption environment, and strengthen consumers' willingness to spend, to help ensure sustained positive development of the economy," Sheng noted.

He further emphasized that in the first quarter, the issuance of new special-purpose bonds reached nearly one trillion yuan (around 136 billion U.S. dollars).

Infrastructure investment grew by 5.8 percent, 1.4 percentage points higher than the average growth rate of the entire previous year, Sheng added.

"Driven by efforts to implement major national strategies and build up security capacity in key areas, particularly policies encouraging large-scale equipment upgrades, investment in the purchase of equipment and machinery nationwide increased by 19 percent year on year in the first quarter, 3.3 percentage points higher than the average growth rate of the entire last year. This growth contributed 64.6 percent to overall investment growth, effectively driving investment," the deputy director said.

He also pointed out that the policies have effectively promoted industrial production, and boosted market activity and confidence.

"The combination of new and existing policies has assisted the economy in getting off to a good start early this year. Moving forward, we will further focus on thorough, practical and specific implementation of policies to fully unleash their potential," he continued.

China's macro-economic policies drive consumption, investment growth: authorities

The Syrian government and people have roundly welcomed U.S. President Donald Trump's announcement to lift all sanctions against Syria, with many believing it will give a major boost to the conflict-ravaged country's recovery from years of civil war.

Trump announced during his visit to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday that he would remove the long-standing sanctions on Syria, with the Syrian foreign ministry welcoming the move as a "pivotal turning point for the Syrian people".

Another significant moment came on Wednesday when Trump held a face-to-face meeting with Syrian interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa in the Saudi capital Riyadh -- marking the first encounter between a U.S. president and a Syrian leader in decades -- with the two discussing the normalization of bilateral ties.

Prior to Trump's announcement, the Syrian foreign ministry noted that the long-imposed sanctions, which originally applied to the former government, were still having a direct impact on the Syrian people and had hindered efforts to facilitate the country's post-war recovery and reconstruction.

The news of the removal of all U.S. punitive measures was immediately met with an outpouring of joy in Syria, with large crowds taking to the streets of Damascus and elsewhere in the country to celebrate.

The Syrian pound also reportedly gained in value following Trump's decision.

Ziad Arabsh, an economic consultant for the Syrian government, said the U.S. move has now cleared a major obstacle to Syria's economic recovery and post-war reconstruction efforts.

"The access of Syria to the world technology is extremely vital to rebuild the long years [of] destroyed infrastructure, and this will lead to the economy [being boosted] and help Syria in [its] reconstruction instead of sliding into fragmentation," Arabsh said in an interview with the China Global Television Network (CGTN) in Damascus.

Trump's surprise announcement came on the first day of his four-day whirlwind tour across the Middle East, which has seen him visit Saudi Arabia and Qatar before he is expected to conclude the trip in the United Arab Emirates.

Trump's remarks about the sanctions relief and his meeting with al-Sharaa came at a time when the new leadership in Damascus is striving to rally international support for the country to cope with extreme challenges after over a decade of conflict and economic hardship.

Syrians welcome Trump's announcement to lift all sanctions