Industrial enterprises in 22 Chinese provinces, regions and municipalities generated 1.11 trillion yuan (US$163 billion) of profit in the first seven months, down 17.3 percent from the same period last year, according to the latest official figures.

The decline is 3.8 percentage points lower than that in the first six months, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said in a statement Friday.

The revenues gathered by the industrial companies' core businesses reached 21.4 trillion yuan in the first seven months, up 0.9 percent from last year. The growth rate is 0.5 percentage points higher than that in the first six months.

Of the 39 industrial sectors, 14 achieved a rebound in profit growth, nine recorded a slow-down in profit declines and four turned slumping profit to rebounding profit.

The 22 regions refer to China's provinces, regions and municipalities minus Beijing, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Hunan, Guangdong, Anhui, Hainan, Chongqing, Yunnan and Tibet Autonomous Region.

The NBS used to publicize national industrial profit every two months, but began to issue the information monthly to improve monitoring frequency on economy this year. Only 22 provinces, regions or municipalities now provide monthly industrial profit data.

(Xinhua News Agency August 31, 2009)