China turns to big data for property price trends

(ECNS) -- By teaming up with internet giant Baidu, China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has utilized big data technology to forecast price trends in the country's real-estate market, the Shanghai-based China Business News reported.

The bureau disclosed its new approach at an open day in Beijing on Friday and demonstrated how it could predicate price trends in the capital with amazing accuracy.

The traditional real-estate monitoring system is thought to have gaps, with related data scattered among several departments in China and factors like personal privacy and false contracts preventing true collation.

Data from Baidu's search engine, which attracts more than 160 million users daily through mobile devices alone, could give statistical officials faster access to information that point to emerging trends.

Scientists have tracked the prevailence of property-relate searches conducted by Chinese netizens and established models using historical property data, in similar principle to Google's Flu Trends.

This approach might make better predication of second-home price trend easier, the report said.

Once applied in practice, it would help authorities predict new trends several days in advance. It is also expected to test the accuracy of data collected via traditional means.

The bureau signed a strategic partnership agreement last November with 11 high-tech Chinese companies to develop big data technology, including Baidu and Alibaba.

Ma Jiantang, head of the NBS, said by cooperating with these companies, the bureau can explore the use of big data technology in official statistics and make findings more scientific.