China's logistics market had ranked first in the world in terms of scale for nine consecutive years as of 2024, said the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing in a report on Friday.
Last year, China's total social logistics value came at 360.6 trillion yuan (about 50.3 trillion U.S. dollars), a 5.8-percent expansion year over year, while the combined revenue of the industry reached 13.8 trillion yuan, according to the China Logistics and Supply Chain Development Report (2024-2025) issued by the federation.
China's courier sector delivered 175 billion parcels in 2024, up 20 percent from the previous year, securing its position as the world's largest parcel delivery market for 11 straight years.
The surge in express delivery volume was largely driven by demand for logistics services in the booming cross-border e-commerce sector, which registered 2.15 trillion yuan in export volume, a rise of 16.9 percent year on year.
China saw its international freight volume in 2024 grow 29.3 percent compared with the previous year.
Moreover, Chinese enterprises had built more than 2,500 overseas warehouses as of the end of 2024.
The ratio of social logistics cost to GDP, a key indicator reflecting cost efficiency of the sector, was 14.1 percent in 2024, down 0.3 percentage points from the previous year and hitting a record low, said the report.
Calculated based on China's GDP in 2024, the drop in the reading was equivalent to a reduction of more than 400 billion yuan (about 55.8 billion U.S. dollars) in logistics costs, the federation said.
China's policymakers identified lowering logistics costs as part of measures to spur growth at December's Central Economic Work Conference, with plans to launch special actions for that in 2025.
China's logistics market scale ranks first in world for 9 consecutive years: report
China will roll out a series of targeted measures to stabilize investment and unlock greater space for private capital, an official said on Thursday.
Chen Changsheng, deputy director of the State Council Research Office who participated in the drafting of this year's Government Work Report, made the statement at a press briefing held in Beijing.
He noted that China will leverage the guiding role of government funding and the driving effect of major projects to shore up investment.
Total government investment this year is set to exceed five trillion yuan (about 725 billion U.S. dollars), which will come from central budget investment and local government special bonds for major national strategies and security capacity building projects and equipment upgrades. Meanwhile, 109 major projects have been planned in the draft outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030).
China will also stimulate investment by opening up more application scenarios for businesses.
On the traditional front, a long-term mechanism will be improved to encourage private enterprises to participate in major national projects. For emerging sectors, China will further open scenarios in biomedicine, aerospace, and the low-altitude economy.
"Low-altitude economy has developed rapidly in recent years, with sound applications seen in fields such as agriculture, forestry plant protection, as well as surveying and inspection. Going forward, we will accelerate the opening of airspace resources and streamline approval procedures for low-altitude flights. This will unlock new scenarios including low-altitude logistics and urban management. Similar new opportunities can also be found in service robots and other sectors, all of which will create new space for private investment," Chen said.
By deepening reforms to further unlock investment potential, China will ease market access in the service sector, speed up revisions to the Bidding Law and the Government Procurement Law, and advance price reforms to broaden investment access for more enterprises.
"We will see a new round of investment potential unleashed. Major projects including the national water network, a new round of power grid upgrades, new generation communication networks, and computing power networks will drive massive investment, including demand from urban development. In addition, the campaign this year to expand and upgrade the service sector and the development of emerging industries will further expand space for private investment," Chen noted.
China to take measures to boost investment, expand space for private investment in 2026: official
