China on Thursday announced that it would radically reform its gross domestic product calculation methodology and statistics release, to make it at par with international standards.

"We will reform the GDP calculation and statistics release based on international standards, so that the statistics objectively reflect the performance of the Chinese economy," the director of the National Bureau of Statistics, Li Deshui, told reporters in Beijing.

Li said the Chinese government has recently approved the new methodology and the NBS would implement it in 2004.

"Some traditional methods did not comply with international norms, arousing some criticism from the international community," he said.

China would most be following the US model in future GDP calculations and release of such information, he added.

The reform plan will mainly focus on the annual and quarterly GDP calculation. Statistics and the method of calculation will be made public if necessary. Henceforth, the NBS as well as the provincial governments would not release monthly GDP figures except in special circumstances.

China's GDP grew at 8.5 per cent in the first three quarters of this year.