China's consumption heats up in Q1

China's consumer market continues to heat up in the first three months of this year, according to the latest research released by the State Information Center. The rise in consumption is driven by a number of policies, and the release of consumption potential was accelerated, CCTV news reported on Saturday.

The research shows that offline consumption picks up its speed in the first quarter. An index for measuring offline consumption intensity saw a growth of 14.2 percent year-on-year, 9.1 percentage points than that of the previous quarter.

An index for measuring small commodity market operations grew by 21.6 percent year-on-year in March, indicating that the small commodity sales continue to maintain vigorous vitality, which reflects the acceleration of people's livelihood consumption demand.

The consumer market for daily-life service continues to grow in the first quarter, with an index for measuring the vitality of daily-life service showing an increase of 18.3 percent from a year earlier, of which the year-on-year growth of 14.5 percent in March. The index for the leisure and entertainment industry, as well as the catering industry grew by 67.6 percent and 14.5 percent respectively in the first three months.

The enthusiasm for traveling stayed high during the Qingming Festival holiday or Tomb-Sweeping Day, which falls on April 4 this year. The online search volume for keywords related to Qingming outings and appreciating flowers has increased by more than four times, according to data released by the State Information Center.

Diversified consumption scenarios are proliferating during the holiday, injecting new vitality into China's consumption market.