China is now the second largest economy in the world

Chinese officials have acknowledged that the Chinese economy has overtaken Japan's, and is now second only to the US.

Mr Yi Gang, China's chief currency regulator, mentioned the milestone on Friday, 30 July 2010. "China, in fact, is now already the world's second-largest economy," he said in an interview with China Reform magazine posted on the website (www.safe.gov.cn) of his agency, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange.

"China's economy expanded 11.1% in the first half of 2010, from a year earlier, and is likely to log growth of more than 9% for the whole year. China has averaged more than 9.5% growth annually since it embarked on market reforms in 1978. But that pace was bound to slow over time as a matter of arithmetic," Yi said.

"China is still a developing country, and we should be wise enough to know ourselves," Yi said, when asked whether the time was ripe for the yuan to become an international currency.

While China's economy has grown substantially over the past few decades, per capita income stands just at $3,800, which is a fraction of that in the developed countries.

A Reuters news report on this was published in the Times of India, on 31 July 2010.