All 12 provinces and autonomous regions in western China registered economic growth rates higher than the national level of eight percent last year, according to the Statistics Bureau of the Tibet Autonomous Region.
In 2002, Tibet and Qinghai Province led the west with a growth rate of 12.4 percent each, while the lowest rate, in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, was still as high as 8.1 percent.
Analysts attributed the fast growth to China's strategy of developing the vast landlocked west area that has long suffered an underdeveloped economy.
Last year, most of the area's growth rates in all three of the country's pillar industries were faster than the nation's average.
The service sector, or the third industry, for example, has soared in the west. Compared with the national rate of 7.3 percent, the sector in Tibet grew by 15.2 percent last year, ranking first in the area.
The western China area includes Tibet, Qinghai, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Sichuan Province, Chongqing Municipality, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Shaanxi Province, Gansu Province, Guizhou Province, Yunnan Province and Xinjiang.
(Xinhua News Agency March 15, 2003)
