China Plans Statistical Overhaul to Better Capture Digital Economy

China’s National Bureau of Statistics has unveiled a five-year plan to overhaul how it measures the economy, targeting gaps in data on the digital economy, employment and service consumption.

The bureau released the plan Wednesday, pledging to prioritize data quality and build a statistical system suited to the country’s digital transformation. 

A key focus is national accounting. The plan calls for pilots to measure data assets and a system to calculate value added by the digital and platform economies.