Davos doubters won over by China

While participants at forum expressed concern, it soon became clear that Chinese economy is fundamentally sound

For years, China's economy has been center stage at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. This year's gathering from Jan 20 to 23 was no exception.

While also focusing on new global trends, the EU's migrant crisis, terrorism, regional conflicts and other issues, China was still a primary subject.

The participants even showed their concerns in a straightforward way.

"Is China's economy still OK?" I was repeatedly asked.

Other Chinese participants and journalists were asked the same question.

This is not the first time that the world has been gripped with anxiety about the state of the Chinese economy. Fortunately, past forecasts of doom, which predicted a hard landing and economic collapse, have never come true, and they are unlikely to materialize this time, either.

Vice-President Li Yuanchao provided figures and told vivid stories in his speech to answer the question and convince attendees at this year's gathering that China's economy is still doing well and has sound fundamentals.

For example, he said China has boosted entrepreneurship by cutting the red tape for business startups, which has resulted in up to 12,000 new businesses every day and is promoting the fourth industrial revolution. Putting Internet technology and connectivity at the heart of transformations was the theme of this year's forum, and it is set to become a new driving force of China's economy in the coming years.

During Li's speech, a friend of mine posted a comment via the instant messaging app WeChat saying the vice-president was talking about whether China will be OK economically. After hearing the speech, she posted another comment saying that China will "always be OK".

Klaus Schwab, chairman of the World Economic Forum, also said he was convinced by Li's confidence when he chaired the talks

But not all the Chinese participants had the same optimism. Many from academia urged the government to speed up the implementation of its reform agenda, which was formulated two years ago. They are concerned about the delay in pushing forward reforms and how the unfolding geopolitical challenges are affecting China's economic development.

In Davos, some opinion leaders said the world faced unprecedented challenges and risks last year.

When asked to respond to that, Jin Liqun, president of the recently launched Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, while not going into details, said that the worst time in history was even tougher than what happened last year. He said that those saying it was the worst of times were doing so because their memories of last year are still fresh. He concluded with an upbeat assessment of the future prospects for China's economy.

Such optimism was shared by the executives of the so-called BAT companies (Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent), which are dominant Chinese tech giants, and other fast-growing private enterprises.

Tian Ning, 39, is the founder of Panshi, a listed Internet company that manages advertisements on a majority of Chinese language websites. He expressed the same optimism about the Chinese economy as Alibaba's Jack Ma.

Although some traditional companies may be struggling, Tian says, Chinese companies are among those leading the so-called fourth industrial revolution. The revenues and profits of his company have been growing for years, adding that his company's overseas offices will reach 50 by the end of this year. At present it has 16 overseas offices.

"China is a big market but the world is even bigger," Tian says, encapsulating his confidence in his company's global expansion plans.

Challenges will continue to emerge as China makes the transition from an economy driven by exports and investment to one driven by innovation and consumption. But while the road ahead might be difficult, the road map is clear - and the journey has begun.

The author is China Daily chief correspondent in Brussels. Contact the writer at fujing@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 01/29/2016 page11)