Xi Jinping uses new Mao-like status to outline longer-term economic blueprint for China
As well as the key ‘battles’ – risk, poverty and pollution – Beijing’s economic policies for 2018 and beyond also touch on issues to do with quality of life
President Xi Jinping, China’s most powerful leader in decades, has mapped out a plan to renew the economy in three years by tackling financial risk, reducing poverty and fighting the country’s chronic smog problem.
At the three-day, closed-door economic work meeting that concluded in Beijing on Wednesday, the top leadership decided China will follow a “high quality” growth model with more focus on fairness, the environment and a joyful life, Xinhua reported. That takes the place of the old “high speed” model that for decades has put the expansion of gross domestic product above all else.
In a departure from previous years, Xi used the annual meeting to draft three-year, rather than one-year, plans for the financial sector clean-up and environmental management. The policies also touch on a wide range of issues that matter to the everyday lives of the country’s 1.3 billion people, including too much homework for children, difficulties getting an appointment to see a doctor, the nursing shortage and online scams.
“Unlike his predecessors, Xi is willing to compromise and more determined to push forward this work [by tolerating slower GDP growth],” said Ding Shuang, chief Greater China economist at Standard Chartered Bank in Hong Kong.