The GDP growth of East China’s Zhejiang province picked up in the third quarter as exports and investment rebounded, provincial governor Xia Baolong said during a session of the ongoing 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China

The province’s GDP growth hit 7.7 percent in the first three quarters of this year, up 0.6 percentage points on the first quarter and up 0.3 percentage points on the first six months.

Xia said the pick-up in economic growth was due to rebounding exports and investment.

After experiencing negative growth in exports in both July and August, the province’s exports climbed 6.4 percent to $21.15 billion in September. The growth rate in October was 11.2 percentage points higher than the previous month.

Moreover, investment in the first three quarters grew 23.5 percent, up 6.5 percentage points on the first quarter, among which private investment grew 26 percent. Private investment accounted for 63.3 percent of all these investments, Xia said.

Meanwhile, the quality of the province’s economic growth has been improving due to its efforts to reshuffle the economic structure and the growth mode.

In 2011 the Chinese Academy of Sciences issued a report on scientific development in China, a key strategy to harness economic growth onto sustainable and scientific paths to avoid blind expansion. The report indicated that Zhejiang led the nation in 2010 and 2011 in terms of overall development strength.

The academy also looked at the GDP quality index, which is a measurement of GDP growth that takes into account a number of factors, including people’s happiness and environmental protection. The results showed that Zhejiang was also number one in China by this measure.