Well-thought-out target

Deng Haiqing, Chief Economist at JZ Securities, said a lower target doesn’t equal an economic downturn, nor does it mean a growth rate lower than 6.5 percent.

“Such target aims to create space for deepening the supply-side structural reform and avoid situations where local governments’ hands are so tied by GDP targets that they cannot effectively implement measures of reform,” he said.

Despite the slightly lower economic growth rate, China remains a significant contributor to the world economy. According to National Bureau of Statistics, China’s GDP grew 6.7 percent year on year to 74.4 trillion yuan ($10.83 trillion) in 2016, which contributed 33.2 percent to the global economic growth in the year.

Experts say that, after China’s economy started recovering in 2016, setting the target at around 6.5 percent will secure employment and allow the country to achieve its objective of building a well-off society in an all-round way by 2020.

“A country with a population of 1.3 billion, China is under serious pressure of job creation. An economy without a relatively fast growth rate cannot create enough new jobs,” said He Lifeng, Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission.

He said experience showed that about 1.7 million new jobs could be created for each 1-percentage-point rise in the country’s GDP growth rate. China will see 7.95 million new university and college graduates and a considerable number of young people enter the job market in 2017. “To meet our preset target of securing 11 million jobs, we need