Beijing  - China's economic growth fell to 6.8 per cent in the final
quarter of 2008, its slowest expansion since 2001, as the global
economic downturn hit China's exports, the national statistics bureau
said Thursday.

The year-on-year growth rate compared to 9-per-cent growth in the third quarter, the bureau said.

For all of 2008, China's economy expanded at a 9-per-cent pace,
reaching 30.07 trillion yuan (4.42 trillion dollars), the first time
since 2003 that it had not hit double digits.

In 2007, China's gross domestic product grew 13 per cent.

"The international financial crisis is deepening and spreading while
its negative impact on the domestic economy is continuing," Ma
Jiantang, the bureau's director, said at a press conference in Beijing.
(dpa)