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Full Text: China's economic and social development plan
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-03-19 09:06


In accordance with the general aims cited above and in the Outline of the Eleventh Five-Year Plan and taking into consideration both necessity and feasibility, we set the major targets for economic and social development in 2007 as follows.

--An appropriate rate of economic growth based on economic restructuring, improved economic performance and reduced energy consumption and pollutant emission. We will increase the proportion of tertiary and high-tech industries in the overall economy. Government revenue for the year will total 4.4065 trillion yuan, with GDP increasing by about 8%. GDP growth has hovered around 10% or slightly higher in recent years. We are leaving some leeway in this year's targets for economic growth to indicate to society the government's intentions in terms of macroeconomic regulation and to guide all sectors of the economy to focus on improving economic structure, changing the pattern of economic growth and improving overall quality and performance. We also hope to prevent people from single-mindedly competing for the fastest economic growth and thereby promote sound and rapid economic growth. The economic growth targets are indicators of the anticipated levels and are for guidance only. Local governments should set targets for local GDP growth at an appropriate level inline with local conditions.

--Creation of at least nine million new jobs for urban residents with urban registered unemployment under 4.6%. Although the employment situation will present a fair amount of difficulty this year, with hard work, coupled with sustained rapid economic growth and more results produced by government policies to promote employment, it will be possible for us to reach these targets.

--Increase in both per capita disposable income of urban residents and per capita net income of rural residents of 6% in real terms, and increase in retail sales of consumer goods of 12%. Factors that will contribute to a steady rise in urban and rural incomes include improved national financial strength, better enterprise performance, deepened reform of the income distribution system and the implementation of measures such as the building of a new socialist countryside, efforts to increase rural incomes, strengthening of the social safety net and poverty alleviation programs. However, achieving this year's targets will still require an enormous amount of effort because we still need to overcome many difficulties and restraints in order to increase the incomes of rural residents and low-income urban residents.

--Rise in the consumer price index under 3%. The major considerations behind this target are: proactive yet prudent price reform for resource products, adjustments in the prices of public goods and services and the aftereffects of last year's year-end rises in the prices of grain, edible oil and other farm and sideline products, all of which will tend to drive up the price level to a certain extent.

--Continued progress in science and technology, education, health, culture and other social programs. The ratio of research and development expenditures compared to GDP is expected to increase to 1.56%. The secondary gross enrollment ratio should reach 65%, and plans call for enrolling 5.67 million undergraduate students and 424,000 graduate students in regular institutions of higher learning. The system of public cultural services will be strengthened. Trials of the new rural cooperative medical care system will be expanded to cover at least 80% of all counties (county-level cities and districts). The natural population growth rate should stay under 7.5.

--Improvement in the balance of payments. Because the current international environment should remain favorable overall, and domestic enterprises and their products are becoming more competitive, growth in exports should remain strong. There should be a reasonable increase in the scale of imports as a result of the end of the transition period for China's WTO entry coupled with policies to encourage imports and the service trade, which should hold down the excessive rate of increase in the trade surplus to a certain extent.

III. Major Tasks and Measures for Economic and Social Development in 2007

To reach this year's targets for economic and social development, we must make unified overall plans and focus on key areas. We need to pay particular attention to the following eight aspects of our work.

1. We will continue improving macroeconomic regulation and maintain stable economic performance. We need to continue to follow prudent fiscal and monetary policies.1) We need to reduce the central government budget deficit by an appropriate amount and continue to adjust the structure of expenditures. The deficit in the central government budget for 2007 is projected to be 245 billion yuan, 50 billion yuan less than last year. We need to make proper arrangements for any revenue in excess of the projected figure. We will vigorously work to increase revenue and reduce expenditures and improve the performance of budgetary funds.2) We need to reduce the issuance of long-term treasury bonds and appropriately arrange investment allocations from the central government budget. We plan to issue 50 billion yuan worth of long-term treasury bonds in 2007, 10 billion less than last year, and allocate 80.4 billion yuan from the central government budget for regular development projects, 25 billion more than last year, together for total central government funds for development projects of 130.4 billion yuan. In accordance with the requirement to improve the structure of expenditures, focus on key areas, shore up weak links and concentrate resources on accomplishing major tasks, the central government will allocate more development funds to certain areas than it did last year. These include efforts to directly improve rural working and living conditions, support for social programs such as elementary education and public health, and promoting the large-scale development of the western region. In addition, support for energy conservation, environmental protection and independent innovation will also be increased.3) We need to maintain a reasonable growth rate in the money supply and improve the structure of loan portfolios. The broad money supply (M2) is expected to grow by 16% in 2007. We will make comprehensive use of a variety of monetary and credit tools to continue to improve liquidity management in the banking sector, guide financial institutions in controlling the pace of credit growth and keep the amount of long- and medium-term loans at an appropriate level. Lending to enterprises that consume large quantities of energy or cause serious pollution and poorly performing enterprises in industries with excess production capacity will be strictly controlled. We will increase financial support for agriculture, rural areas and farmers, small and medium-sized enterprises, independent innovation, energy conservation, environmental protection, social programs and underdeveloped areas.

4) We need to maintain overall price stability. We will strengthen monitoring and analysis of the overall price level as well as trends in the prices of major goods and services such as grain, cotton, petroleum, coal, steel and commercial housing. We will do a good job spot-checking market prices.

We need to continue to improve regulation of fixed asset investment.

1) We need to continue to restrict the development of industries that consume large amounts of energy and resources, seriously pollute the environment or have excess production capacity by maintaining strict control over availability of land and credit and market access. We need to appropriately raise and strictly enforce standards for approval of development projects in terms of land, environmental protection, energy conservation, technology and safety in accordance with the situation in each industry. We will build on our achievements in reviewing newly launched projects and rigorously control market access for new projects, paying particular attention to controlling the scale of urban development. We will strictly control building and expansion of office buildings of administrative organs and prohibit construction of luxurious office buildings and halls. We need to set up a mechanism to coordinate the actions of government departments in approving and managing new projects and work out a system for announcing and disseminating information on new projects.2) We need to increase efforts to implement projects of major overall importance for long-term economic and social development and give more support to weak links in the economy such as agriculture, the service sector, social programs, energy conservation, environmental protection, independent innovation and underdeveloped areas. We will employ economic means such as subsidies, discount interest, tax and pricing to give full play to the role of government funding in properly guiding non-government investment.3) We need to strengthen the management and oversight of investment projects. We will promptly set up a preparatory reserve system for investment projects and improve inspection and supervision to ensure the safety of funds and overall project quality. We need to vigorously expand consumer demand.1) We need to accelerate adjustment of the distribution of national revenue and promote continued increase in the incomes of both urban and rural residents, paying particular attention to constantly increasing the incomes and purchasing power of rural residents and low-income urban residents.2) We need to expand rural consumer demand. We will increase support for the development of the rural distribution infrastructure, such as the rural commodity distribution network, wholesale markets for agricultural products and a modern system of grain distribution. We will improve the distribution network for agricultural supplies and continue the project to encourage retailers to open stores in more townships and villages and the project to support 100 large wholesale markets for farm products and 100 large rural retail distributors.3) We need to fully implement policies for regulating the real estate market. We will accelerate the construction of low-rent housing and low- and medium-priced condominiums of modest size for ordinary people, and improve and standardize the system of affordable housing to improve the housing conditions of low-income families. We must punish violators of laws and regulations in all links of the real estate industry, including development, sales and real estate agencies, to curb overheating in housing prices.4) We need to expand areas of consumer spending. We will strongly develop e-commerce, increase consumer spending in areas such as tourism to key sites in the early CPC history, rural tourism, culture, fitness, sports and recreation, and foster and expand new areas of consumption.5) We need to further improve the environment for consumption. We will improve policies related to medical charges and drug prices, standardize prices of medical equipment and fully implement the system for publicly announcing school fees. We will conduct monitoring and inspection of prices and charges related to farmers, enterprises, education, medicine, real estate, and services such as telecommunications and public utilities (water, electricity, oil and natural gas), improve market oversight and management and protect the legitimate rights and interests of consumers. We need to do a good job regulating economic activities. We will focus on development of modern high-capacity coalmines while combining or upgrading small and medium-sized ones. We will accelerate development of oil and gas resources, gradually establish an oil storage system and speed up the planning and building of oil and gas pipelines. We will accelerate the development of power grids, build more high-quality thermal power plants, vigorously develop hydropower stations and accelerate the development of nuclear energy and renewable energy sources such as solar energy, biomass energy, wind power and geothermal energy. We will intensify efforts to shore up weak links in coal transportation routes and develop embarkation ports and other major aspects of the transportation infrastructure. We will carefully maintain a proper balance among the different means of transportation to ensure rational distribution of transportation resources and improve the overall efficiency of the transportation industry. We will further standardize the management of power use to make it more orderly, launch the trials of the "efficient power plant" power-saving scheme and set up a long-term mechanism for improving the demand side management of power. We will do more to balance supply and demand in coal, electricity, oil and transportation and first of all ensure that household requirements of the people as well as demand in key areas and institutions such as hospitals, schools, banks, grain and fertilizer are met.

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