China Q1 accommodation, catering sector shrinks for first time since 2020

BEIJING: China's accommodation and catering sector contracted in January-March from a year earlier for the first time since 2020, pointing to increasingly flagging consumption weakened by COVID curbs on travel and social-distancing rules.

The sector's output shrank by an inflation-adjusted 0.3% in January-March to 386.1 billion yuan ($60.6 billion), the National Bureau of Statistics said in a statement on Tuesday.