Markets down, jobs down, growth down – everywhere, it seems, except China. Yesterday’s revelation that the economy grew 13 per cent in 2007, versus an original estimate of 11.9, makes China the world’s third biggest economy. Statistical bodies often tweak published data. But 110 basis points, equivalent to $114bn, is quite an adjustment. And when the nation doing the revising is China, eyebrows invariably rise. Has anything changed since 2005, when Beijing found almost $300bn down the back of the sofa?

The National Bureau of Statistics has sharpened up its act in recent years, borrowing techniques from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and US Department of Agriculture to improve data-gathering. But figures from cities and provinces still have an unknowable shuifen, or “water content”, the euphemism given to the fluidity of some numbers. It is unlikely that a crack squad set up in 2006 to investigate manipulated data will, or can, catch all offenders.