BEIJING — China’s lottery sales amounted to 214.7 billion yuan ($33.6 billion) in the first seven months of 2015, down 0.4 percent year on year, official data showed on Aug 24.

July alone saw over 27 billion yuan’s worth of lottery tickets sold, a year-on-year decline of 27.3 percent, due to the high base in the same period last year, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) announced.

January-July, welfare lottery sales increased by 2.1 percent to reach 118.4 billion yuan, while the sports lottery dropped 3.4 percent to hit 96.3 billion yuan, the MOF data showed.

Lottery sales in east China’s Shandong province rose by 1.36 billion yuan from a year ago, while Inner Mongolia autonomous region, Henan, Hebei and Zhejiang provinces also posted large increases, according to the MOF.

Under lottery management rules, money from ticket sales must cover administrative fees and public welfare projects as well as the jackpot.