BEIJING -- Growth in the electronic information sector has slowed due to sluggish investment, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said in a Thursday statement.

In the first eight months, sales revenues for the sector reached 5.3 trillion yuan ($840 billion), up 9.9 percent from the same period of last year. The growth rate represents a year-on-year drop of 0.3 percentage points, according to the statement.

Meanwhile, the electronics industry attracted investment worth a total of 599.8 billion yuan, up 7.1 percentage points from a year earlier, said the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

However, the investment growth rate was 60.6 percentage points lower than that of the same period last year, it said.