Investment remains key to China's economic growth. Data from China's top economic planner released Wednesday backed that view. 

China is picking up its pace in investment from a year ago.

The NDRC approved 154 billion yuan's worth of fixed asset investment in January. That was down from December, but triple the amount a year ago.

The top investment picks for China? Water conservancy, transport and energy, almost in line with the investment focus in 2016. The NDRC believes the strategy helped the economy transform in 2016.

"We see China's growth in 2016 moderated and stabilized but the quality of growth improved. That is a positive sign, we believe, as the structure of growth optimizes and the efficiency of economy picks up," NDRC spokesman Zhao Chenxin said.

China last year had invested 7.9 trillion yuan, or about 1.4 trillion US dollars, in major projects by the end of 2016.

More than half of the total investment went into major infrastructure projects. The money was spent on information tech, power grids, energy and transportation.

China's clean energy sector attracted 15 percent of the total investment. However, less than 10 percent of the total investment was spent on fighting pollution.

China has been touting its Made-In-China 2025 project, which aims to boost the efficiency and tech level of the country's industrial sector.

However, NDRC data showed that China only spent 30.4 billion yuan in that area last year. That's only one-third of a percent of the total investment.

The NDRC indicated that it will leave some of that work to foreign investors.