BEIJING  -- China's producer price index (PPI), which measures inflation at the wholesale level, dropped 3.6 percent year on year in September, National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed Monday

The figure compares with a 3.5 percent decline in August and marks the seventh straight month of decline. China's PPI dropped in March for the first time since December 2009.

On a month-on-month basis, the PPI moved down 0.1 percent in September, according to the NBS.

The bureau also announced Monday that the country's consumer price index (CPI), a key gauge of inflation, grew 1.9 percent year-on-year in September.

Xu Lianzhong, an economist from the price monitoring center of the National Development and Reform Commission, said the data was "quite normal and within expectations", signaling that the Chinese economy had started to stabilize.

Although the country's economy, especially industrial enterprises, are facing increasing deflationary pressure, Xu does not expect huge stimulus measures to be issued within the year. However, fine tuning of fiscal and monetary policies could be possible.

With the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China around the corner, Xu said policymakers would place more attention on stabilizing the economy rather than looking for a fast rate of growth.

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