Japan acknowledges China has overtaken it as world's second-largest economy

New Delhi, Feb 14 (ANI): China's economy has surpassed Japan's as the world's second largest in 2010, the Japanese Cabinet Office has said.

China was acknowledged last year as having grown to the world's second-largest economy, but the Japanese data confirming it was not available until Monday.

It further showed a late-year downturn was Japan's first quarterly contraction in more than a year.

Japan's nominal GDP last year came to 5.4742 trillion dollars, less than China's total of 5.8786 trillion dollars, the Cabinet Office said.

Gross domestic product shrunk at an annualized rate of 1.1 percent in the October-December quarter, a sharp reversal from a revised 3.3 percent expansion in the third quarter, Xinhua quoted Japan's Cabinet Office, as saying.

Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has pledged to revive the economy and make major reforms in the country's tax and social welfare systems.

His approval ratings are eroding quickly, however, as voters question his government's ability to lead the country through its pressing problems. (ANI)