CRI听力:2011 Fiscal Revenue

The Ministry of Finance says central fiscal revenue reached 5.13 trillion yuan last year, up 20.8 percent from the previous year, while local governments collected 5.24 trillion yuan, a 29.1-percent increase.

Jia Kang, Director of the Fiscal Science Research Center at the Ministry of Finance, explains.

"The growth rate reflects the overall situation of China's sound and rapid economic development which has been driving the growth of fiscal revenue. It would definitely bring many positive effects because more fiscal revenue means more funds to meet the needs of public welfare improvement and social development."

Tax revenue rose 22.6 percent year-on-year to 8.97 trillion yuan last year, and non-tax revenue surged 41.7 percent to 1.4 trillion yuan. The ministry attributes the increase to relatively fast economic growth, price hikes, surging corporate income tax and the move to include non-budgetary funds in its budget management.

Corporate income tax rose 30.5 percent from a year earlier to 1.68 trillion yuan, boosted by the good economic returns of enterprises.

On a quarterly basis, the growth of the nation's fiscal revenue slowed last year. Fiscal revenue growth fell to 10 percent in the fourth quarter compared with 33.1 percent in the first quarter, 29.6 percent in the second quarter and 25.9 percent in the third quarter.

Finance insiders say this was caused by an economic slump, personal income tax reform, easing inflation and waning transaction volumes in the country's auto and property sectors. Here is Jia Kang from the Ministry of Finance.

"It is related to the overall situation of economic development. The first half of 2011 saw relatively faster economic growth, and commodity prices remained high, driving the fiscal revenue to grow at a higher rate. But then the economic growth slowed down a little bit, and commodity prices started to fall in the second half of the year."

Bai Jingming, a researcher at the Ministry of Finance, says when the economy in the country's western and central parts experiences faster growth, the structure of the regional fiscal revenue growth rate will change.

"In the eastern part of the country, the fiscal revenue growth rate is about 20 percent, but the number has been as high as 30 percent in the western and central parts of the country."

The ministry says the fiscal expenditure structure was further optimized last year, and it increased support for sectors dealing with people's livelihoods such as education, medical and health care, social security, employment, housing and culture.

For CRI, I am Zhang Wan.