Examining China's sustainable development based on genuine progress indicator

China is now facing trade-offs between economic growth and the resulting environmental and social burdens. In the 14th Five-Year Plan and the 2035 long-term goal, China put forward in-depth sustainable development strategies. To examine sustainability, a metric reflecting social and environmental costs is necessary, such as the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI). However, data quality has become an important factor affecting the credibility of the included items in GPI. Hence, we conducted the first China Genuine Progress indicator Survey (CGPiS) at the micro-household level containing 42,000 samples. Based on this, we improved the GPI framework covering 23 subitems and measured China's national-level and provincial-level GPI in 2016. The results indicate that a region with a higher GDP usually has a higher GPI, while the gaps of sustainable economic welfare measured by GPI between regions are larger than the GDP gaps. Environmental accounts in all measured provinces are negative. Housework and volunteer service in the social account have great potential contributions to the future growth of GPI. Our findings are essential for driving changes in China's economic governance to realize sustainable development and promoting the GPI application in pilot cities. (C) 2021 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.