BEIJING — China's crude oil output rose 2.8 percent year-on-year to 16.67 million metric tons in June, official data showed.

The June output grew 3.5 percent from the 2019 level. The daily oil output last month stood at 556,000 tons, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

In the first six months, the country's crude oil output came in at 99.32 million tons, an increase of 2.4 percent from a year earlier.

As one of the world's largest oil buyers, China imported 40.14 million tons of crude oil in June, down 24.5 percent year-on-year.

The crude oil imports dropped 3 percent year-on-year in the first half of the year to 260.66 million tons, the NBS data showed.