Leveraging advantages, inland areas grab competition from big industries.

Their total profits stood at 8.4 trillion yuan in this period, down 4 percent from a year earlier, the NBS data revealed.

Its output growth rates over the past two years far exceeded that of the three leading coal-producing regions of Shanxi, Shaanxi, and Inner Mongolia.

China aims to have its CO2 emissions peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060.

Power consumption data can reflect situations of enterprises' production and economic operation, and thus become a key barometer of economic activity, experts said.

Northeast China's Heilongjiang province saw its foreign trade in goods grow by 33 percent year-on-year to 265.15 billion yuan ($39.44 billion) in 2022, customs data showed.

This year, Inner Mongolia will also step up the clean and efficient use of coal, Wang said.

Exports would recover slowly because of the global economic downturn, according to the newspaper.