(Yicai  Global) Feb. 18 -- Ningbo and Zhengzhou have entered China's elite club  of cities that boast a gross domestic product in excess of CNY1  trillion (USD147.6 billion). The group of 16 urban hubs accounts for  close to one-third of the country's total GDP.

Some  28 Chinese cities were home to economic output of more than CNY700  billion last year while those of the top five cities all exceeded CNY2  trillion, according to government data. 

Other  members of the CNY1 trillion GDP group include Shanghai, Beijing,  Tianjin and Chongqing, as well as Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Wuhan, Chengdu,  Hangzhou, Nanjing, Qingdao, Changsha, Suzhou and Wuxi.

Regional Supremacy

Among  these 16 richest cities, six are located in the most-developed Yangtze  River Delta region while Hefei, the capital of Anhui province, was the  only major city in the region not to make the list. 

The  four major urban agglomerations of the Pearl River Delta,  Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Chengdu-Chongqing and the middle reaches of the  Yangtze River all have two cities in the ranking. Only Zhengzhou in  central China and Qingdao in eastern Shandong do not belong to the above  urban areas.

The  developed coastal areas of the east had 11 cities in the ranking, while  only three came from the central region and two from the west.

Foshan in southern Guangdong province narrowly missed out on the CNY1 trillion-mark with a GDP of CNY993.6 billion last year. 

Other  cities that missed out include Xi'an, Jinan, Quanzhou, Dongguan and  Nantong, which all boasted economic output in excess of CNY800 billion  and could join the club in the future.

Sustained Growth in Richest Cities

China's  richest cities continued to grow more prosperous last year. Beijing  joined Shanghai in having a GDP of more than CNY3 trillion, far ahead of  their peers. Shenzhen, the third-largest, achieved a 7.6 percent rise  in total economic output to CNY424.2 billion and its growth rate was the  fastest among the top seven cities. Guangzhou remained in fourth, and  Chongqing, a western municipality directly under the central government,  became a new member of the CNY2 trillion GDP club last year.

Economic  growth in Chongqing, as well as sixth-positioned Tianjin, has slowed  down in recent years. The two have gradually entered structural  adjustment after years of industrial and investment-led economic growth,  so expansion has naturally slowed.

Editor: William Clegg