China's civil aviation industry gained rapid recovering momentum in 2003, said Yang Yuanyuan, director of the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China, in Beijing on Thursday.

He said China's aggregate air traffic mileage in 2003 reached 17.07 billion ton-kilometers, the passenger traffic volume totaled87.59 million, and the cargo volume added up to 2.19 million tons,up 3.5 percent, 1.9 percent, 8.4 percent respectively over 2002.

The overall aviation income reached 106.8 billion yuan (US$12.91 billion), an increase of 1.4 percent over the previous year.

(Xinhua News Agency January 15, 2004)