By Gina Lee

Investing.com – China’s economy grew at its slowest pace in a year in the third quarter of 2021, with a global energy crunch, supply chain bottlenecks, and an unsteady property market also adding pressure on policymakers to bolster a faltering economic recovery.

said that the GDP grew 0.2% , against the 0.5% growth in forecasts prepared by Investing.com and the previous month’s 1.3% growth. The GDP grew 4.9%, less than the 5.2% increase in forecasts by Investing.com or the 7.9% growth that was recorded in August 2020.

China Evergrande China’s ongoing problems with Group (HK:), supply chain delays and energy crunch, as well as the debt crisis facing Group (HK:), are all major challenges that China must overcome.

Fu Linghui, spokesperson for National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), stated that “the domestic economic recovery remains unstable and uneven.”

The slow growth is in contrast to the country’s impressive economic recovery from COVID-19 in 2020, boosted by effective virus containment and increasing overseas demand for Chinese manufactured goods.

Louis Kuijs, head of Asiaeconomics at Oxford Economics, said that policymakers would take additional steps to stem the “ugly growth” numbers they expect to see in the coming months.

Developer China Evergrande Group’s debt woes continue, and worries about a potential spillover of credit risk from China’s property sector into the broader economy also continue to mount.

Meanwhile, grew 3.1% year-on-year in September, lower than the 4.5% growth in forecasts prepared by Investing.com and the previous month’s 5.3% growth.

grew 4.4% year-on-year in September, higher than the 3.3% in Investing.com forecasts and the previous month’s 2.5% growth. This was lower than August’s 5.1% growth rate of 4.9%.

Due to the impact of energy crises, the industry sector was hit hard by power rationing and coal shortages. Environmental curbs on polluters such as steel plants, and flooding over the summer have also impacted this sector.

Iris Pang, chief economist at ING Greater China said that most of the problems are caused by policy.