COMMENDING THE GOVERNMENT’S WORK

COVER STORY

COMMENDING THE GOVERNMENT’S WORK

The Fifth Session of the 11th National People’s Congress (NPC) opened on March 5, with Premier Wen Jiabao delivering the government work report that summarized the work done in 2011 and illustrated the work to be done in 2012.

According to the report, in 2012 the GDP growth is expected to settle around 7.5 percent, while the consumer price index (CPI) growth target remains at 4 percent. The report also promotes a remarkable increase in spending earmarked for the people’s well-being and even names detailed projects.

Some deputies to the 11th NPC and members of the 11th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) provided their interpretations of the report toBeijing Reviewreporters Lan Xinzhen and Zeng Wenhui.

Yuan Chunqing NPC deputy,Secretary of the CPC Shanxi Provincial Committee

I have been truly inspired and feel con fi dent about the report.

First, it reflects continuity of last year’s policies. The report proposes balancing the relationship between steady and robust economic development and economic restructuring as well as managing in fl ation expectation, urgently carrying out the proactive fiscal policy and the prudent monetary policy, and making expanding domestic demand, improving investment structure, stabilizing prices, increasing farmers’incomes by various means, adjusting industrial structure and steadily promoting urbanization the nation’s top priorities.

Second, it reflects the reliability of economic indices. After setting the 8-percent growth expectation from 2005 to 2011, the target of economic growth was slashed by half a percentage point. The CPI will be controlled around 4 percent this year. This fully considers the complicated economic situation and the high inflation in 2012 and reserves space for the restructuring and price reform.

Third, it is clear and concise in explaining the measures to be taken. For example, the report puts forward formulating implementation rules to encourage and guide private investment, proposes specific measures to control the real estate market and develop low-income housing, requires that spending on education by local governments should be 4 percent of their GDP fi gures.

Fourth, it reflects the scientific arrangement of economic development. The report emphasizes combining stabilizing economic growth, controlling prices, bene fi ting people’s well-being, deepening reform and promoting harmony. As for regional development, the report emphasizes coordinated development of central and western regions and the effort to let special economic zones and pilot zones play a full role in comprehensive reforms. As for industrial distribution, the report proposes to strengthen support to the development of strategic emerging industries.

Gao Xianhai NPC deputy,Mayor of Nanchong,Sichuan Province

Fifth, it reflects wider benefits for the people’s well-being. The report emphasizes raising the proportion of individual income in national income and puts forward many detailed and specific measures in raising people’s incomes and solving their dif fi culties in education, housing and medical services.Premier Wen’s report this year is quite rational, setting the target of economic growth this year at 7.5 percent. This comes from the government’s proper analysis of the situation and fully reflects the confidence and resolution of the Central Government. To appropriately slow down the economic growth speed is conducive to balancing relations between supply and demand, to alleviating pressures on resources and environment and to easing the tension of high prices. It will also improve the quality of China’s economic growth.

The Chinese economy now faces plethora pressures, both internally and externally, such as the economic recession in Europe and the United States, slowdown of China’s exports,unbalanced domestic economic structure and high employment pressures. Hence, to slightly lower the target for economic growth conforms to the changes of both the domestic and international economy.

It is easier to maintain steady economic development, but to promote a robust growth we have to rely on consumer demand. The government work report sets expanding domestic demand, particularly consumer demand, as one of the focuses this year,indicating that there will be significant adjustments on the economic growth pattern,including thoroughly changing the past situation of relying on investment and exports to drive economic development and strengthening the role of domestic demand. From the report we can expect that the Central Government will issue powerful policies this year to stimulate domestic demand.

Wang Yongzheng CPPCC National Committee member, President of Yongzheng Tailor Shop Group Co.Ltd.

The government work report proposes increasing credit support to enterprises, especially small and micro-businesses, whose operations are in line with industrial policies and whose products are in high demand. I think the government should adopt various measures to ease the financing difficulty of small and micro-enterprises.

To solve the fi nancing dif fi culties of small and micro-enterprises, we should turn to the banks. Banks should be classified with differentiated policies: Now that it is dif fi cult for large banks to support small and micro-enterprises, the government should grant favorable policies to small banks in taxation, credit scale and internal control to inspire them to grant loans to small and micro-enterprises, and the increased costs can be made up for by government favorable policies such as tax cut.

Private lending should also be incorporated into the legal system to satisfy the credit demand of small and micro-enterprises. At present many people are in lack of investment channels,since returns from portfolio investment are low.Opening and regulating private lending will be a good way out for private funds.

Hu Jianwen NPC deputy,General Manager of Linwu Shuhua Duck Industrial Development Corp. Ltd.,Hunan Province)

This year, spending on education will account for 4 percent of the GDP, input in agriculture and rural areas will increase by 186.8 billion yuan ($29.6 billion), more than 7 million lowincome homes will be built, and the pension system for rural residents and for non-working urban residents will cover all the country.These figures and targets are inspiring.The report sets concrete targets in improving people’s well-being and makes solemn commitments. The government work report illustrates again that people’s well-being is the focus of the work of the government.

Further, this year’s government work report has cited the following tasks in the list of focuses: fully introducing social insurance against uraemia and seven other major diseases and including lung cancer and 11 other major diseases in the pilot program to provide insurance and aid for their treatment. This indicates the government’s more thoughtful care to people’s well-being.

Bo Shaoye CPPCC National Committee member,Director of Rights Protection Department of China Disabled Persons’Federation

When illustrating the topic of ensuring and improving people’s well-being, Premier Wen put increasing jobs as the top priority. We suggest when addressing the employment issues, the government should emphasize employment of vulnerable groups, including the physically challenged, women and ethnic minorities and ensure employment fairness.

China has formulated many policies and legal provisions to promote employment of vulnerable groups, but there are many problems in the actual implementation of these policies. I suggest that government agencies and public institutions take the lead in carrying out the legal provisions and offer more job opportunities to vulnerable groups.

There are many limitations on the physically challenged in the recruitment of civil servants. We do not require lowering the recruitment standards for the disabled, but employment discrimination should be eliminated among equally quali fi ed candidates.

Besides the disabled, women are also discriminated when employed for the reasons of age, physical condition and even the ideas of the employers. Ethnic minorities in many remote areas are also facing job dif fi culty due to poor education and limited professional skills. The government should pay suf fi cient attention to them too.

LiuYonghao CPPCC National Committee member,President of New Hope Group

The government work report says China will carry out an intense crackdown on violations of intellectual property rights and the manufacture and sale of counterfeit or substandard goods, enhance food safety oversight capability and raise the level of food security. I think food quality and security should be ensured by government efforts to support and encourage high-quality enterprises and crack down on producers and sellers of counterfeit or substandard goods. Access to food producers should be increased, and more aid should be offered to small enterprises so that they can devote more efforts to food security.

The government should firmly crack down on producers of counterfeit and substandard goods and grant fiscal and taxation incentives to those of high-quality products.

We should also fi rmly resist the behavior of dumping in low prices and disturbing the market order. The earliest producers of some daily products can ensure the product quality for high profits. But after a large number of producers enter the market, the fierce competition forces the producers to adopt a lowprice strategy and their profits are reduced.Then problems of quality and safety have ensued because many enterprises are making shoddy products.

Zhong Nanshan NPC deputy, a health expert from Guangdong Province

Premier Wen’s report spends many paragraphs illustrating the necessity to conserve energy, reduce emissions and protect the ecological environment, and puts air quality monitoring and pollution control on top of the agenda. It clari fi es to start monitoring fi ne particulate matter (PM 2.5) in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta, and other key areas, as well as in municipalities directly under the Central Government and provincial capital cities, and states that the practice will be extended to all cities at and above the prefecture level by 2015. This is inspiring.

Air pollution is a problem facing the whole country and every person, and even the whole world, and we cannot expect the problem to be resolved simply by relying on a certain region. Therefore I suggest carrying out monitoring throughout the country so as to timely discover problems and solve them.The monitoring should cover all the country starting from this year instead of in 2015, and prevention and control measures can be fi rst implemented in some key regions. Real basic data should be obtained through monitoring to facilitate formulation of measures for conserving energy, reducing emissions and improving the ecological environment. We should not seek economic development at the expense of the ecological environment and our people’s health.