Li calls for quality growth for economy, livelihoods

Premier Li Keqiang called on Friday for concerted endeavors to promote high-quality development and economic transformation for healthy and sustainable economic progress while improving people’s livelihoods.

Li made the remark at a plenary meeting of the State Council, China’s Cabinet.

Amid fundamental changes in global geopolitics, China is facing new opportunities and many unimaginable challenges, the premier said.

He called for making development the most vital priority and undertaking urgent efforts to transform methods of economic growth and restructuring of the Chinese economy.

“We should keep the economy running in a stable way for high-quality development,” Li told heads of State Council departments at the meeting.

We should keep the economy running in a stable way for high-quality development.” Premier Li Keqiang

Li emphasized reforms and changing governmental functions to boost market vitality. Administrative reforms should be deepened to strengthen internal vitality, he said. Relations between the government and the market should be well-managed to ensure the latter’s decisive role in resource allocations, he said.

In the next step, administrative streamlining should be furthered while the threshold for market access and fees charged by the government should be lowered, he said. Oversight compliance will be strengthened to cultivate an environment for fair competition for both domestic and overseas companies while redundancies in supervision should be abolished, he said.

New development concepts should be adopted to accelerate the transformation from old growth momentum to new, the premier said.

Inclusive and cautious supervision should also be used to promote new technologies, new business models and core competitiveness among domestic industries, he said.

Li also required all departments under the Cabinet to ensure improvements in people’s livelihoods in areas such as poverty alleviation, employment, compulsory education, basic medical needs and seniors’ nursing care. Market entities should be encouraged to provide nonpublic services to meet diverse demands of the public, he said.

Risk management was also cited as a priority by the premier and the State Council to maintain social and economic stability.