The State Council Information Office held a press conference on April 20. The spokesperson of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology stated that the development of industry and information technology achieved a stable start in the first quarter. Statistics show that in the first quarter, the added value of industries above designated size increased by 3% year-on-year, reversing the continuous downward trend since October last year. Among them, the production and sales of automobiles in March increased by 15.3% and 9.7% year-on-year respectively, and the production and sales of new energy vehicles in March increased by 44.8% and 34.8% year-on-year respectively.
In the first quarter, manufacturing investment increased by 7% year-on-year, 1.9 percentage points higher than the national fixed asset investment. The industrial growth rate of Hebei, Shandong, Jiangsu and other major industrial provinces is significantly higher than the national level; since March, the industrial economy of Guangdong, Zhejiang and other provinces has picked up momentum. The empowering effect of the information and communication industry continues to emerge.
In the first quarter, revenue from telecommunications services increased by 7.7% year-on-year, the cumulative number of 5G base stations built exceeded 2.64 million, and gigabit access users exceeded the scale of 100 million. 5G is fully integrated into 52 major categories of the national economy, strongly supporting high-quality economic and social development.