China's oil product consumption in August rose 7.1 percent from a year earlier to 22.22 million tons, according to statistics released by the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) on Thursday.

Gasoline and diesel consumption in August rose 10.1 percent and 6.5 percent, respectively, on an annual basis.

China's oil product consumption in the first eight months of the year inched up a mere 3.8 percent year-on-year, as demand waned amid a slowing economy. Stimulus measures totalling RMB 1 trillion ($158 billion) announced earlier this month are expected boost consumption.

Crude oil production in China in the January-August period declined 0.9 percent year-on-year to 134.63 million tons, the NDRC said without giving an explanation.

Analysts said China's biggest oil companies slashed production in June and July amid low international crude prices and that while production gained in August it was still less than a year earlier.

"China has limited crude oil reserves of about two billion tons so is not able to substantially raise output to meet growing domestic demand," Han Qiang, an oil industry researcher, told Interfax on Friday.

Unless significant new discoveries are made the market expects China's annual crude oil output to settle at approximately 200 million tons over the next decade.

The lack of domestic reserves will only raise China's dependence on overseas oil, noted Han. China imported 253.78 million tons of oil in 2011, representing 54.2 percent of total demand in that year.

Imports could account for 66 percent of total oil demand as early as 2020, Ke Xiaoming, deputy director of the Sinopec Economics & Development Research Institute's Marketing Research Department, said at a conference in June.