OTHER SIGNS SHOW WEAKNESS

But other economic indicators showed declines. The consumer price index, a main gauge of inflation, fell 1.2 percent year on year in March, compared with a decline of 1.6 percent in February, the first monthly fall since December 2002. And the producer price index, a measure of inflation at the wholesale level, fell 6 percent in March.

Declines slowed in power consumption, an important indicator of industrial activity. It dropped 3.49 percent in March, compared with an 11.37-percent decline in December last year. Power use fell 5.2 percent in the January-February period, according to the China Electricity Council.

Many Chinese statistics for the first two months were released as a unit, partly because of the change in the Lunar New Year, which this year fell in January instead of February.

According to the State Grid Corporation of China, power consumption rose 1.3 percent year on year in the first 10 days of March, but then fell 2.2 percent in the second 10 days and 2.7 percent in the last 10 days. The first 10 days of April showed a year-on-year drop of about 3.57 percent.

Zhang Liqun, a researcher with the Development Research Center of the State Council (cabinet), said statistics for March trade, real estate sales and fiscal revenue showed positive signs. By that, he meant that the rate of decline had in many cases eased. The effects of the government's stimulus package would become more evident in the second quarter, he said.