On April 19, 2021, a visitor tries smart equipment at the AI innovation and application summit in Jinan, East China's province of Shandong. PHOTO XINHUA China should take more measures in the second half of the year in order to promote a sustained economic recovery, policy advisers said on Monday.
They called for specific measures to support the healthy development of the platform economy and more financial products to advance digital technologies.
Liu Shijin, deputy director of the Committee on Economic Affairs of the National Committee on the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, said that the country should pay more attention to reform and opening-up and to unleash the potential of innovation in the second half to stabilize the economy.
The ultimate motivator for growth can come from tapping into structural growth drivers, according to Liu at a news conference on Monday.
He said that there needs to be more efforts to promote the development of city clusters, improve the efficiency of basic industries, expand middle-income groups and accelerate digital transformation and green development.
Liu said that the country will be able to achieve both short and long-term development goals with further reforms planned to overcome the constraints in these sectors, with a GDP growth target of 5.5 percent for the second half.
China's economic growth slowed to 2.5 percent year-on-year in the first half due to unexpected shocks, including COVID 19 outbreaks, but has shown signs of recovery since May.
The brightening growth prospects of the Chinese economy, led by innovative sectors, is evidenced by the resilient financial market performance.
The Shanghai Composite Index was up 1.55 percent to close at 3278.10 points on Monday, with 40 stocks in the new energy vehicle sector hitting the daily upper limit, according to market tracker Wind Info.
The Chinese currency held its strength thanks to stable economic fundamentals, as the onshore exchange rate of the renminbi against the US dollar was 6.7340 as of Monday evening, down 5.68 percent since the beginning of the year.
The Japanese yen and the euro have weakened by more than 10 percent against the dollar for the first time in 20 years, with the dollar and the euro worth the same for the first time in 20 years last week.
Despite unexpected shocks and a brisk momentum in the high-tech manufacturing and new energy sectors, a positive second-quarter GDP growth in China's economy has pointed to the resilience of the Chinese economy, said Liu, who is also a member of the CPPCC National Committee.
Miao Wei, former Minister of Industry and Information Technology and a member of the CPPCC National Committee, underlined the need to take concrete measures to support the healthy development of the platform economy as soon as possible, for the sake of stabilizing expectations over the sector's development prospects and boosting market confidence.
Miao said that efforts should be made to encourage platform enterprises to participate in national scientific and technological projects, enable them to get listed at home and abroad, and bring in more financial products in the capital market to support digital technologies.