NANJING: Jiangsu province is showing signs of recovery from the global economic downturn, fueling hopes of steady growth this year, latest figures from the provincial statistics bureau have showed.

The province resumed investment growth in the last two months of last year, while sales of commercial residential properties also started to rebound with a 233 percent monthly growth in residential space last December from that of a month earlier, the figures showed.

Export-oriented enterprises have been one of the worst-hit sectors in the economic crisis but Jiangsu still saw a 16.9 percent increase of its export value with a total value of $234 billion in the year, the bureau reported.