Zhejiang's economy continued to demonstrate resilience in July, with steady growth in consumption, exports, and logistics, according to data released by the Zhejiang Provincial Bureau of Statistics on Aug 21.

Retail sales of consumer goods reached 300.8 billion yuan ($41.5 billion) in July, up 4.4 percent year-on-year. Goods retail accounted for 272.9 billion yuan of that total, rising 4.9 percent. From January to July, total retail sales stood at 2.2 trillion yuan, representing a 5.2 percent increase year-on-year.

Foreign trade remained strong. From January to July, total imports and exports reached 3.19 trillion yuan, up 5.9 percent. Exports rose 8.4 percent to 2.42 trillion yuan, while imports dipped 1.1 percent to 770 billion yuan. Private enterprises played a major role, contributing 2.62 trillion yuan in trade — up 7.5 percent — and accounting for 81.9 percent of the province’s total trade volume, up 1.2 percentage points from the previous year.

Passenger transport continued its recovery. In July, 53.13 million passenger trips were recorded, up 1.1 percent year-on-year. Rail passenger volume grew by 2.0 percent. Passenger turnover reached 9.79 billion person-kilometers, a 1.6 percent increase. For the January-July period, passenger volume and turnover rose by 3.0 percent and 2.3 percent, respectively.

Cargo transport showed even stronger momentum. Freight volume reached 350 million metric tons in July, up 10.1 percent year-on-year — 3.1 percentage points higher than the previous month. Highway freight rose 10.7 percent, while waterway freight increased 9.2 percent.