CHINA’S property and construction industries contracted in the third quarter for the first time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, weighed by a slump in real estate.

Output in the real estate industry, a mainstay of the economy as its activities supports sectors from furniture to commodities, shrank 1.6 percent from a year ago, according to a supplemental report on gross domestic product released yesterday by the National Bureau of Statistics.

The sector grew 7.1 percent in the three months through June and this contraction is the first since the first quarter of 2020.

The construction industry’s output fell by 1.8 percent, also its first decline since the pandemic. Before the pandemic, that sector had never contracted in data back to 1992.

The debt crisis at some domestic developers has undermined consumers’ confidence in buying homes and exacerbated the effect of tight curbs on property developers’ financing and property sale restrictions to cap prices.

The combined sales of China’s top 100 developers plummeted 36 percent year on year in September, and the slow government-funded infrastructure construction has also undercut the building sectors.

China’s economy slowed further in the third quarter, weighed down by the housing slump and electricity shortages, data released Monday showed. Gross domestic product expanded 4.9 percent from a year earlier, down from 7.9 percent in the previous quarter.

Production halts at factories across China due to a power shortage is reflected in the slowdown of the manufacturing industry, which expanded 4.6 percent in the third quarter, down from 9.2 percent a quarter ago. (SD-Agencies)