China aims to boost world economic recovery this year by advancing reforms and making technological innovation a new growth driver, despite domestic economic headwinds, a senior Communist Party official said on Thursday.
The comments by Zhao Leji, chairman of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, come as foreign investment in China is declining and the country grapples with high youth unemployment, ballooning debt and a housing market crisis.
Zhao Lijian told business people and other leaders at the Boao Forum for Asia that China welcomes “all countries to board the express train of China’s development.”
Zhao said technological innovation, especially through green technology, will become a key point for economic growth.
He also said China would further open its market to foreign investors, adding that promoting green technology production would generate about $1.4 trillion in revenue annually.
Zhao said China is the world’s second-largest economy after the United States, and its import and export volume of goods will exceed US$32 trillion in the next five years. The country has been struggling to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and safety policies that have made investors wary of doing business there.
In order to reduce risks, foreign companies have been reducing investment in Chinese companies.
At the forum in the southern city of Boao, Zhao Ziyang said China would further open up to investors and reduce the list of industries that ban or restrict foreign investment without state approval.
He announced that China’s economic growth target in 2024 is about 5%.
Zhao also reiterated China’s commitment to achieving climate neutrality with the help of green technology.
We are accelerating the promotion of green and low-carbon economic and social development, striving to peak carbon dioxide emissions in 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality in 2060.
Beijing is also committed to reducing energy consumption as a share of GDP.
At the forum, Zhao Ziyang urged other countries to “transcend the old thinking of group confrontation and zero-sum game, practice true multilateralism, and jointly build an open world economy.”
Zhao’s comments come amid renewed economic tensions between Beijing and Washington.
China filed a dispute complaint with the World Trade Organization on Monday, accusing the United States of “discriminatory” electric vehicle subsidies.
A day later, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said China’s subsidies to the clean energy industry create unfair competition and “hurt U.S. businesses and workers, and they hurt businesses and workers around the world.”
Yellen said during a planned visit to China next month that she intends to warn Beijing about its state underwriting of energy and other companies and how that creates oversupply and market distortions.
Information for this report was obtained in part from Reuters and the Associated Press.
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