China sets 2018 GDP target at 'around 6.5%'

AFP

Beijing, ChinaUpdated: Mar 05, 2018, 01:31 AM IST

As China was never completely colonised, it continued to be ruled by its monarchs until Chinese Communist leader Mao Zedong declared the creation of the People's Republic of China (PRC) after the Chinese Revolution of 1949. It celebrates National Day and not Independence Day. Photograph:(Others)

China has set its 2018 economic growth target at "around 6.5 percent", lower than the 6.9 output that the country registered last year.

The target remains the same as last year and was presented in a report for Monday's opening session of the annual National People's Congress, the rubber-stamp parliament.

The figure, along with an inflation target of three percent, is "fitting given the fact that China's economy is transitioning from a phase of rapid growth to a stage of high-quality development", the report said.

China beat forecasts in 2017 as the world's second grew by 6.9 percent, picking up steam for the first time since 2010 despite a battle against massive debt and polluting factories.

Beijing has largely relied on debt-fuelled investment and exports to drive its tremendous economic growth of the past four decades but it is now seeking to move its economy to more sustainable consumption-based growth.