The National Bureau of Statistics of China and China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing (EFLP) jointly released China’s official manufacturing purchasing managers' index (PMI) on Saturday. The official manufacturing PMI, a leading macroeconomic indicator, edged down to 51.4 in October, higher than the median forecast of 51.3 in a Reuters poll, marking an expansion for 8 consecutive months. The non-manufacturing business activity index rose by 0.3 percentage point month-on-month to 56.2 in October, the highest since October 2013, when it was 56.3. The composite PMI was 55.3 in October, up 0.2 percentage points from the previous month. Although the official manufacturing PMI edged down in October, it remained in an expansion range for eight months in a row, Reuters said. Together with the recovery of the services sector and the acceleration of the recovery in the non-manufacturing sector, the composite PMI rose in October. With the rapid recovery of production and demand and the continued improvement of imports and exports, China's economy continued its steady recovery. According to the data from the Bureau of Statistics, among the five sub-indices constituting the manufacturing PMI, the production index, the new order index and the supplier delivery time index are all above the threshold, while the raw material inventory index and the employment index are all below the threshold. In terms of enterprise scale, the PMI for large enterprises was 52.6, 0.1 percentage point higher than last month. The PMI for medium-sized enterprises came in at 50.6, down 0.1 percentage points from the previous month. The PMI for small businesses came in at 49.4, down 0.7 percentage points from the previous month. This shows that small and medium-sized enterprises are still facing a more severe market environment. From the perspective of non-manufacturing industries, the indices of business activities in railway transportation, air transportation, accommodation, telecommunications, radio and television satellite transmission services, culture, sports and entertainment industries are above 60.0%, while the indexes of business activities in capital market services are below the threshold.