China's third economic census enters registration phase

China's third national economic census has entered its registration phase after months of preparation. That's according to the National Bureau of Statistics. The census is designed to paint a wide economic picture of China's fast-expanding secondary and tertiary industries and complete a database covering all economic sectors.

The census will survey over 10 million companies and 60 million privately or individually-owned businesses in the next three months. Nearly three million statisticians will collect data related to enterprise ownership, staff size, financial status, production capacity and research and development activities during the census.

The final results will be released in the second half of 2014. The census is conducted once every five years.

"The economic census will help us figure out the structure of our country's economy. Policies which are conducive to developing the economy and improving people's livelihood will be made more scientific and accurate based on the economic census." Ma Jiantang, commissioner of National Bureau of Statistics, said.