According to reports on China's economic and social development since the 16th Party Congress issued by the National Statistics Bureau, China's national economy has developed very rapidly and maintained long-term, stable development. China's total economic value has increased in rank from sixth to fourth in the world; and the average per capita income has entered the middle income level internationally. In the past five years, development has laid a solid foundation for the third step in China's strategic targets in national economic and social development.
The report said that the past four years since 2003 were one of the periods when the Chinese economy developed the fastest and the longest. From 2003 to 2006, the average GDP growth rate stood at 10.4% - 5.5 percentage points higher than the world average of 4.9%. It is also 0.7 percentage points higher than the average growth rate of 9.7% in China since reform and opening up in 1978.
While sustaining fast development, the Chinese economy has also developed steadily. The speed is rapid, but the fluctuation is small. From 2003 to 2006, the gap between the highest and lowest growth rates was just 1.1 percentage points. The economy developed steadily at a high speed.
Meanwhile, China went from having the sixth largest economy in the world, to the fourth, within four years. In 2002, China's GDP reached 12 trillion yuan (1.6 trillion US dollars); while in 2006, the GDP reached 21.1 trillion yuan (2.8 trillion US dollars), with an average increase of 2.3 trillion yuan every year.
With the increase in total quantity, China's GDP surpassed France and Britain in 2005 to rank the fourth in the world. In 2006, the Chinese economy maintained fourth place; while gaps between the US, Japan, and Germany became smaller.
In 2002, China's GDP was just 13.9% of that of the US, 37% of that of Japan, and 71.8% of that of Germany. However, in 2006, it was 20% of that of the US, 60.6% of that of Japan and 91.3% of that of Germany. China's GDP accounted for 4.4% of the world's total in 2002; while in 2006 it accounted for 5.5%.
China's per capita income has doubled and entered the middle income level internationally. In 2002, China's per capita income surpassed 1,000 US dollars for the first time to 1,100 dollars; while in 2006, the per capita income increased to 2,010 dollars – with an increase in ranking to 129th in the world, from 132nd position in 2002. According to World Bank standards, China is one of the middle income countries in the world. This indicates that China has made a solid step forward in the process of building an all-round healthy and wealthy society.
By People's Daily Online |
