China's economy is facing considerable pressure due to the slowdown but the government has a host of policies to halt the slide, Premier Li Keqiang today said as he tried to allay fears about flagging growth in the world's second largest economy.
Addressing a press conference at the end of the 10-day meeting annual of the legislature, the National People's Congress (NPC), Li said the new GDP target of around 7 per cent set for this year is not easy to meet.
This year we set the anticipated GDP target approximately 7 per cent. It is true that we have adjusted downward our GDP target but it will by no means easy for us to meet this target," he said.
Li said because China's economic aggregate is expanding and its size now is valued at about $10 trillion which is equivalent to the total economy of a medium sized country.
Referring to the concerns and worries about slow growth in China, he said, "We must ensure Chinese economy operate within a proper range".
"The good news is that in the past couple of years we did not resort to massive stimulus measures for economic growth. That has made it possible for us to have fairly ample room to pursue economic regulation and we still have host of policy instruments at our disposal," he said.
To shore up growth, the Chinese government also plans to raise the fiscal deficit target for 2015 to 1.62 trillion yuan. That would be 2.3 per cent of GDP, up from 2.1 per cent in 2014.
