BEIJING -- China did 17.1 billion U.S. dollars of overseas contract business in the January to August period, up 45.5 percent year on year, said the Ministry of Commerce.

Statistics from the ministry show a 105.6 percent rise in the value of newly signed contracts in the first eight months, taking the total to 32.7 billion U.S. dollars.

In May, China's CITIC Group and China Railway Construction Corporation won the bid to build the central and western sections of the Algerian East-West Highway project, with a framework contract valued at 6.25 billion U.S. dollars. In dollar terms, it is China's largest ever overseas project contract.

Apart from communications and transport, Chinese contractors were also busy on projects in fields such as housing and building,electronic communications, petrochemicals and power generation.

Up to the end of August, China had accumulated revenues of 152.9 billion U.S. dollars on overseas contracts and signed contracts worth a total of 218.6 billion U.S. dollars.