Last week the Kunming Municipal Bureau of Statistics released its initial 2007 economic statistics for the city.

Here are some of the more noteworthy numbers:

• Gross domestic product (GDP) for Kunming during 2007 totaled 139.3 billion yuan – more than US$19.3 billion – an increase of 12.5 percent over the city's GDP in 2006.

• Consumer prices rose significantly, with the city's consumer price index (CPI) – a measure of price change among a basket of several common consumer goods – rising 5.8 percent over the year.

• Food prices exhibited the sharpest price increase, jumping an average of 13.9 percent from January to December.

• Fixed asset investment in Kunming last year totaled 81.8 billion yuan, an increase of 25% over 2006.

• Investment in the city's booming real estate sector reached nearly 22.2 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 21.1 percent.

• Retail sales in Kunming were up 17.6 percent in 2007, swelling to 56.9 billion yuan.

• Per capita disposable income within Kunming's urban areas grew to 12,083 yuan, up 6.1 percent over 2006.

• Kunming's rural net income was up 7.1 percent, with the average farmer outside of the city earning 4,003 yuan last year.

• Tourist visits to Kunming increased by 12 percent, with more than 25 million visits to the city in 2007.

• Kunming's total revenue from tourism in 2007 was 16.8 billion yuan, an increase of 8.0 percent over 2006.

• Domestic tourist visits to Kunming grew 12.4 percent last year, totaling 24.3 million visits.

• Kunming recorded 713,400 visits by foreign travelers, up only 0.8 percent over 2006.

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China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released economic statistics for the year 2007 today, with the country's gross domestic product (GDP) growing by 11.4 percent, the highest rate of growth in 13 years for the country's economy.

Currently the world's fourth-largest economy after the United States, Japan and Germany, China recorded a GDP of more than 24.6 trillion yuan (US$3.4 trillion) last year, according to initial NBS calculations.

In other statistics of note, fixed asset investment – fuelled by a nationwide real estate boom – was up 24.8 percent, totaling 13.7 trillion yuan. Consumption continued to climb, with national retail sales for the year reaching 8.9 trillion yuan, up 16.8 percent over 2006.
　　
China's total trade with the rest of the world increased 23.5 percent last year, swelling to more than US$2.17 trillion. Exports from China totaled US$1.21 trillion, a jump of 25.7 percent year-on-year, while the value of imports for the year exceeded US$955 billion, up 20.8 percent.

Last year the rise of the Chinese consumer continued, with per capita disposable income up 17.2 percent, reaching 13,786 yuan (US$1,907). As disposable income grew, however, so did the price of goods in the marketplace. According to NBS statistics, China's consumer price index (CPI) – a measure of the price of a basket of everyday consumer goods – increased by 4.8 percent.

Yunnan province saw the price of goods go up faster than the rest of the country, with the provincial CPI increasing 5.9 percent over 2006.

NBS chief Xie Fuzhan (谢伏瞻) characterized China's continued rapid economic growth as "stable", but also warned of the potential for overheating. Xie also expressed concern over prices being increasingly pushed upward and "structural contradictions" in the country's economy.

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In the past few years as increasing numbers of Chinese nationwide have been trying their luck 'stir-frying' mainland stocks, an increasing number of mainlanders have been testing their investment acumen on a rather unlikely item - tea.

One of the hottest and more surprising investment trends for Chinese in recent years has been the emergence of pu'er tea as an investment item. There has been an explosion in the pu'er tea market with prices seeing yearly increases of 30% - including a 50% jump last year - and some rare pu'ers selling recently at prices more than their weight in gold.

One of the more unique teas found in China, some types of pu'er are fermented and actually improve with age. The tea began to attract the attention of Chinese investors in 2003 as an alternative to investing in more orthodox options such as property or the country's emerging stock markets.

The rise of disposable incomes in recent years has resulted in mainland Chinese possessing larger amounts of capital and a growing eagerness to invest. But the main options for investing are limited to domestic markets which consist mainly of the real estate and stock markets, said Jeff Crosby, Media Director for the Dayi Tea Company, owners of the Menghai Tea Factory in Xishuangbanna.

"Chinese can't take their cash out to the international markets," Crosby said, "so it's natural that there would be a lot of excess liquidity flowing towards a high-performing sector like pu'er."

This rush to invest in pu'er tea has caused substantial fluctuations in tea prices due to the large amount of available capital and demand for the tea, and limited puer production capacity. Much of this fluctuation in price has been seen in older, rare puer teas while the majority of the puer market has maintained fairly stable prices throughout this period.

"The consumer base has expanded markedly over the past few years, leading to rocketing prices for older teas," Crosby said.

Zheng Huanshan, manager of the Jinhui Chaye tea shop in Kunming said that the number of buyers in the pu'er industry has increased several times over in the past few years, with tea production staying fairly consistent - thus pushing prices upward at a dizzying rate.

Although the past few years have been a boom time for pu'er tea, the lucrative investment market has cooled off slightly in recent months. Recently there has been a slight downturn in pu'er prices, most likely due to a combination of factors. According to Zheng, one reason for this may simply be that summer pu'er is always less expensive than spring pu'er due to quality differences between the two.

Another aspect of the pu'er market that may be leading to recent market corrections (if one chooses to view them as such) is that there is a lack of regulation and official standards under which tea producers and sellers must operate. The result is that a portion of the Pu'er tea introduced into the market has been of lower quality than before - or even counterfeit - and a decline in investor confidence has affected prices.

In the long term, Dayi's Crosby expects that pu'er tea will most likely continue to grow in value, with short-term fluctuations scaring off novice investors and speculators - this may ultimately lead to a more stable and mature market for pu'er, with fewer fluctuations and disturbances in the market price.

Crosby said the recurrence of price fluctuations in the pu'er market "will be a big weeding-out process, busting a lot of speculative players and leaving behind a multi-tier market with a few high-end brands commanding high prices and with other labels providing moderately priced stuff for the general consumer."

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