China to reduce trade surplus to zero
(AFP)
Updated: 2006-10-11 19:35
China plans to reduce its bulky trade surplus to zero by the end of the
decade, via a drastic decline in the growth of its exports to the outside world,
the government has said.
Chinese visitors check out the
shoes on display at a shoe exhibition in Beijing. China plans to reduce
its bulky trade surplus to zero by the end of the decade, via a drastic
decline in the growth of its exports to the outside world, the government
has said. [AFP] |
Until 2010, the world's
fourth-largest economy will target 10 percent annual growth in foreign trade,
down from 24 percent growth in the first half of the decade, the commerce
ministry said in a statement on its website Wednesday.
In the next four years, China will target a new foreign trade strategy where
exporters abandon the blind pursuit of growth for growth's own sake in favor of
"quality growth," the ministry said.
Export-oriented companies, especially private enterprises engaged in
labor-intensive manufacturing, must move away from low-price competition and try
to gain a competitive advantage through technical innovation, it said.
China's trade surplus in the first eight months of 2006 hit 95.7 billion
dollars, well on track to bust last year's record of 101.9 billion dollars.
State-run Xinhua news agency also cited unnamed commerce ministry sources as
saying the need to curb continued growth in the nation's ballooning forex
reserves.
The country's forex reserves, the largest in the world, hit 954.5 billion
dollars at the end of July, according to the latest available data.
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