China's parliament, the National People's Congress (NPC), on
Friday endorsed the government work report delivered by Premier Wen
Jiabao that underlines the people's livelihood and sets the
economic growth target at about 8 percent for this year.
Premier Wen's report was approved with 2,862 votes from the
2,889 NPC deputies present at the closing meeting of the
parliament's annual session.
Wen said in the report that the most important task of the
government this year is to promote sound and fast economic
development, with the growth of gross domestic product (GDP)
projected at 8 percent, lower than the staggering 10.7 percent in
2006, which analyst say would be conducive to healthy economic
development in the country.
President Hu Jintao and other top leaders also attended the
closing meeting, presided over by NPC Standing Committee Chairman
Wu Bangguo.
Prior to the ratification, the State Council, or cabinet, made
33 modifications, including 12 major ones, to the report according
to the opinions of parliament members and political advisors.
The Chinese government promised to spend 391.7 billion yuan
(US$50.25 billion) on agriculture, rural areas and farmers this
year, as it vows to develop modern agriculture and build a new
countryside.
To ensure all citizens share the fruits of China's reform and
open-up, Wen said the government will expand the subsistence
allowance system to all rural poor, with an aim to bring some 23.7
million poverty-stricken people under the social security net this
year.
"We need to make education a strategic priority and accelerate
the development of all types of education at all levels," said the
premier.
The government is expected to invest 85.85 billion yuan (US$11
billion) in this field this year, an increase of 41.7 percent over
2006.
The premier reiterated that the government will meet the energy
saving and pollution control targets between 2006 and 2010 despite
last year's setback.
The government set the goal of reducing energy consumption per
unit of GDP by 20 percent and major pollutants discharge by 10
percent in the country's 11th Five-Year Plan for the 2006-2010
period.
A major task of the government to improve the people's
livelihood is to promote medical services in rural areas. To
energetically promote the new type of rural cooperative medical
care system, the government will expand the trial of the services
"cover over 80 percent of all counties, county-level cities and
city districts in China," the premier said.
For this purpose, the government will allocate a total of 10.1
billion yuan (US$1.3 billion) this year, 5.8 billion yuan (US$750
million) more than last year.
"We will improve the mechanism for setting the RMB exchange
rate, strengthen and improve foreign exchange administration, and
actively explore and develop channels and means for appropriately
using state foreign exchange reserves," Wen said, adding, "We will
adopt a variety of measures to gradually ease the imbalance in
international payments."
In the government work report, which covers every facet of the
country's economic and social development, Wen said "building a
solid national defense system and a powerful people's army is a
strategic task in socialist modernization."
According the draft 2007 budget, which was also passed along
with the annual plan for economic and social development, defense
budget of China will increase by 17.8 percent to 350.92 billion
yuan (US$44.94 billion).
The NPC annual session, which began on March 5, also approved
the property law and enterprise income tax law, as well as
resolutions on the election of NPC deputies on the mainland, Hong
Kong and Macao.
Lawmakers attending the annual session also adopted the reports
on the work of China's Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's
Procuratorate.
(Xinhua News Agency March 16, 2007)