China’s Legislative Session to Focus on Economy

To offset weak consumption, Premier Li announced another round of heavy, debt-fueled spending on infrastructure and on assistance to very poor households, particularly in rural areas. Transfers from the central government to provincial governments, which mainly pay for social programs and infrastructure, will jump 18 percent this year.

Zhu Guangyao, a former vice minister of finance who is now a cabinet adviser, had said at a news conference in late January that he expected the target to be about 5.5 percent. But Jude Blanchette, a China specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, had suggested that global supply chain difficulties and the economic and financial fallout from the war in Ukraine might prompt China to set a lower target.

At the congress, Mr. Blanchette predicted, “the biggest concern and the central focus is going to be the economy.”

How long will China seek to keep Covid out?

China has kept the coronavirus almost completely under control within its borders after the initial outbreak in Wuhan two years ago, but at considerable cost: intermittent lockdowns, particularly in border cities, as well as lengthy quarantines for international travelers and sometimes domestic ones as well. Hints could emerge of how China intends to follow the rest of the world in opening up, although possibly not until next year.

Experts say China is unlikely to throw open its borders before the Communist Party congress late this year. When China does start opening up, it will want to avoid the kind of uncontrolled outbreak that has overwhelmed nursing homes and hospitals in Hong Kong, largely taking a toll on the city’s oldest residents, many of whom are unvaccinated.

But in interviews with state media, posts on social media and in public remarks in the past week, China’s top medical experts have begun dropping clues that the country is looking for a less stringent approach that protects lives without being overly disruptive to the economy.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/04/business/economy/china-economy-congress-explained.html