Quality focus augurs well for economy

2017-10-31
China Daily

China’s quality-focused growth model and its further opening-up will benefit the global economy and international governance systems, officials said.

The emphasis on the quality of economic growth rather than quantity and stressing the environment protection issue in the report to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China by General Secretary Xi Jinping two weeks ago has been remarkable, said Alfred Schipke, senior resident representative for the International Monetary Fund in China.

“There is no need of further policy stimulus in China, although it may stabilize growth in the short term,” suggested the IMF official at a seminar on international economic governance reform, hosted by the International Economics and Finance Institute under the Ministry of Finance on Oct 28.

Schipke expects China will continue to engage with other countries, in terms of a further opening-up reform, which is a positive signal to the world and it will also support a strengthening of the domestic economic growth. The multilateral systems, such as the IMF, will also benefit from the progressing globalization, he added.

Vice-Minister of Finance Shi Yaobin said at the seminar that China is and will always be the contributor and participant in international economic governance, “and this will never change”.

He urged to continually push forward reforms of the international governance system through innovative methods. “The reform should better reflect the true economic development status of different member countries and serve a much more stabilized and improved global economy, which also requires to enhance the governance power and efficiency.”

A much fairer and more open governance system should benefit a broader range of countries and prevent the rise of anti-globalization, according to the vice-minister.

“As China has contributed more than 30 percent of the global economic growth, what happens in China will have significant impact on the rest of the world. Its emphasis on the reform implementation will benefit the international governance mechanism as well as the average person in the country and China is very open to the potential challenges,” said Schipke.

“It is pleasing to see that China has tightened financial sector regulations” and the government’s crackdown on financial leveraging is efficient, considering the current moderate household and public sector debt levels, but with a relatively higher level of corporate debt.

The financial sector’s opening, including the liberalization of capital account, is expected, which will bring in more competition from overseas to accelerate domestic development, he said.