China's 2011 fiscal revenue up 24.8% to 10t yuan

China's Ministry of Finance said on Friday that the nation's fiscal revenue grew 24.8 percent year-on-year to hit a record high of 10.37 trillion yuan ($1.64 trillion) in 2011.

Of the total, the central fiscal revenue reached 5.13 trillion yuan, up 20.8 percent from the previous year, while local governments collected 5.24 trillion yuan, up 29.1 percent, the ministry said in a statement on its website.

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 said.

The ministry attributed the increase to relatively fast economic growth, price hikes, surging corporate income tax and the move to bring non-budgetary funds into 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, the ministry said.

On a quarterly basis, the growth of the nation's fiscal revenue slowed last year, caused by an economic slump, personal income tax reform, easing inflation and waning transaction volumes in the country's auto and property sectors, it said.

Fiscal revenue growth fell to 10 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, compared with 33.1 percent in the first quarter, 29.6 percent in the second quarter and 25.9 percent in the third quarter, it noted.

China's economy expanded by 9.2 percent year-on-year in 2011, with its GDP growth rate dropping to a ten-quarter low of 8.9 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

The ministry said personal income tax stood at 605.4 billion yuan in 2011, up 25.2 percent from a year earlier. The tax fell 5.5 percent year-on-year in the fourth quarter of the year after the government raised the personal income tax threshold in September.

Meanwhile, fiscal expenditure nationwide rose 21.2 percent year-on-year to 10.89 trillion yuan in 2011, the ministry said.

Central fiscal expenditure reached 5.64 trillion yuan, while local governments, which received 3.99 trillion yuan in tax rebates and transfer payments from the central budget last year, spent 9.24 trillion yuan, it said.

The fiscal expenditure structure was further optimized last year, the ministry said, adding that it has strengthened support to sectors concerning people's livelihoods, such as education, medical and health care, social security, employment, housing and culture.

Fiscal revenues in China include taxes as well as administrative fees and other government income, such as fines and income from State-owned assets.