Letting in more private capital essential to stabilizing growth

The top authorities have recently pointed out that all-out efforts should be made to expand domestic demand, give full play to the key role of effective investment, and promote infrastructure construction through strengthening land, energy, environmental impact assessment.

Given the mounting downward pressures on the economy, it is important that China figure out how to make targeted and effective investment. And it should focus on key areas and weaker links and launch targeted and orderly investment projects.

The country is facing the triple pressures of shrinking demand, supply shocks and weakening expectations, which threaten stable growth, employment and prices. A strong domestic market is the “ballast stone” for China to cope with various risks and challenges.

Promoting targeted and effective investment will help China create better conditions for free flow of labor, capital and other elements and for the distribution of resources nationwide, which is conducive to facilitating the faster flow of knowledge and information, speeding up the construction of a national unified market, and enhancing China’s ability to resist external shocks. Expanding investment thus remains an important choice.

However, China should carefully choose its investment direction and focus on optimizing the foundation and capacity of the supply side, and on identifying areas and links that are critical to the development of productive forces to lay a solid foundation for its high-quality economic and social development.

The country has an excellent infrastructure system, but problems of incomplete function and low quality transport, water conservancy, urban and rural development, urban agglomeration and other aspects remain. China should tackle these problems.

Considering digital and green transformation has become the general direction of human society’s development, China should make the layout of all kinds of new infrastructure in advance to create conditions for the diffusion of technology and the explosion of new industries.

Given that government investment is only a part of the investment, China should pay special attention to highlighting the role of government investment in driving private capital.

While expanding investment, it should always pay attention to expanding the multiplier effect of government investment and reduce the “crowding out effect” of social capital.

It should further improve its business environment, simplify approval procedures for all types of investment and create better conditions for private capital investment.