New Chinese priorities seen boosting economic progress

The shift in China's economy toward services and consumption underlines the country's success, indicating the obvious in shifting its development pattern and deepening a new round of market-oriented reform since 2013, said Jiang Jianguo, minister of the State Council Information Office, in Geneva on Wednesday.

Speaking ahead of President Xi Jinping's visit to Switzerland next week, Jiang said the growth of the service industry has contributed 58.5 percent to the country's economy in the first three quarters of 2016. Consumption meanwhile generated 71 percent of the country's economic growth during the period.

"The service industry has become the main engine of China's economy and consumption has played an even bigger role," Jiang said at a seminar organized by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the Geneva-based International Center for Trade and Sustainable Development.