China has seen its gross oceanic product exceed 7.76 trillion yuan (about 1.22 U.S. dollars) in 2017, a 6.9 percent year-on-year increase, the State Oceanic Administration (SOA) announced Thursday.
The gross product value generated by China's marine industry accounted for 9.4 percent of the country's GDP that very year, the SOA said in the newly released 2017 China Marine Economy statistical bulletin.
In 2017, China's major costal regions of the Circum-Bohai Sea Economic Zone, the Yangtze River Delta Area, and Pearl River Delta contributed 31.7, 29.6, and 23.4 percent, respectively, to the country's gross oceanic product.
China's marine and ocean industries maintained steady growth in 2017, alongside the growth in sectors such as biological medicine, coastal tourism, and wind power, said SOA spokesperson Zhang Zhanhai.
The country has seen the steady development of its utilization of marine resources, with the expansion of sea water applications such as desalination, and oceaneering, despite the slowing down of investment into marine engineering projects, Zhang said.
China is accelerating the structural adjustment of its marine fisheries, with declining capture production and steady growth in sea farming, he added.
In 2017, the country injected a total of 170 billion yuan (about 26.8 billion U.S. dollars) of investment into the marine industry.
