China's non-financial outbound direct investment, or ODI, rose 7.2 percent year-on-year to 492.76 billion yuan ($69.51 billion) during the first eight months of the year, the Ministry of Commerce said on Thursday.

The non-financial ODI into economies along the Belt and Road reached $13.95 billion, with an increase of 8.2 percent year-on-year. That accounted for 18.6 percent of the total non-financial ODI in the same period, up 0.5 percentage points over the same period a year ago.

The turnover of foreign contracted projects during the period reached 611.37 billion yuan, increasing 2.3 percent from a year earlier. The figure for the economies alongside the Belt and Road was $50.75 billion, accounting for 54.5 percent of the total.

liuzhihua@chinadaily.com.cn