The Chinese economy is showing initial signs of recovery in the wake of a series of government support measures, the National Bureau of Statistics of China said last week.

Sheng Laiyun, spokesman of the bureau, said in a statement posted on the agency’s website: “The domestic demand [in China] has started to rebound in recent months.”

The rationale behind his claim was that consumer prices increased by 0.2 percentage points month-on-month to 1.5 percent in November, while the decline in imports narrowed by 10.4 percentage points in November compared to the prior month.

“I’ll use three phases to describe the current situation [of the Chinese economy]: ‘in line with expectations’; ‘matching the patterns’ [of development]; and ‘commendable’,” Mr Sheng added. He noted the government’s support measures, such as interest rate cuts, had shown signs of having a positive effect on the economy.

Chinese state-run news agency Xinhua also reported on Friday the country’s Premier, Li Keqiang, saying he was “confident” China will have met its 2015 economic growth target of “around 7 percent”. In the first three quarters of this year, the Chinese economy expanded 6.9 percent from a year earlier.