BEIJING — China's crude oil output rose 2.5 percent year-on-year to 16.87 million metric tons in July, official data showed.

The July output grew 3.1 percent from the 2019 level. The daily oil output last month stood at 544,000 metric tons, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

In the first seven months, the country's crude oil output came in at 116.21 million metric tons, an increase of 2.4 percent from a year earlier.

As one of the world's largest oil buyers, China imported 41.24 million metric tons of crude oil in July, down 19.6 percent year-on-year.

The crude oil imports dropped 5.6 percent year-on-year in the Jan-July period to 301.83 million metric tons, the NBS data showed.