China's economy rose 16.8% last year

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BEIJING, Dec. 20 (UPI) -- China's gross domestic product grew by a whopping 16.8 percent last year, Beijing statisticians said Tuesday.

That translates into an economic output of nearly $2 trillion and ranks China ahead of Italy as the world's sixth largest economy.

The only nations ahead of China are the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain and France.

Stephen Green, the senior economist for China at the Standard Chartered Bank in Shanghai, says while all Chinese statistics have problems, accuracy is improving and the revised GDP growth is good news for the Chinese economy.

"A lot of the ratios, which people cite when they talk about worries about China's fiscal problems or its banking problems or its over investment problems, all these ratios they improve now with the bigger GDP," he said.