BEIJING -- Foreign direct investment (FDI) into the Chinese mainland, in actual use, grew 18.7 percent year on year to 84.13 billion yuan ($12.3 billion) in August, the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said Friday.

In the first eight months, FDI inflow amounted to 619.78 billion yuan, up 2.6 percent year on year.

Foreign investment in the service industry came in at 476.61 billion yuan, up 12.1 percent year on year during the January-August period, while investment in the high-tech service sector surged 28.2 percent.

Investment from the Netherlands surged 73.6 percent, while that from Britain rose 17.2 percent, the data showed.

Building on effective containment of the COVID-19 epidemic, China has rigorously rolled out a string of measures to stabilize foreign trade and investment.

Earlier this week, the MOC pledged to significantly increase items on the industry catalog to encourage foreign investment and help foreign-funded firms benefit from preferential policies.

The ministry will continue to implement the negative list for foreign investment and expand the scope of businesses encouraging foreign investment, thereby sharing the market and opportunities in China with foreign investors, said Vice Commerce Minister Wang Shouwen.