China's service sector expanded at the slowest pace in 16 months in December, indicating the sector's recovery was weaker than that of the manufacturing sector, a private survey said today.

The non-manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index, a monthly gauge of China's service sector, fell to 51.7 last month from 52.1 in November, HSBC Holdings Plc and Markit Economics said today.

A reading above 50 suggests business is expanding.

"Despite the moderation of December's headline services PMI, the underlying strength of the service sector improved in terms of stronger new business flows and employment growth," said Qu Hongbin, HSBC chief economist for China, in a statement today.

"This, plus the further pick-up of manufacturing growth, suggests that China is on track for achieving around 8 percent GDP growth in the fourth quarter (last year)," he added.

The private report contrasts with yesterday's official report compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics. The official service PMI registered a four-month high of 56.1 last month.

Both the official and HSBC manufacturing PMIs released this week indicated an economic rebound rather than a slowdown in the country.

"This suggests that the services sector is not participating in economic recovery to the same degree that the manufacturing sector is, given that stimulus measures impacted mostly the manufacturing industry," said Dariusz Kowalczyk, senior economist at Credit Agricole.

"The result also highlights the fact that ongoing recovery of the Chinese economy is relatively subdued," he said in a research note today.