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Bo: GDP growth exceeds 9% in 2005
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-12-19 13:51 HONG KONG - China's economic growth is on track to
surpass 9 percent in 2005, Commerce Minister Bo Xilai said on Monday.
Chinese commerce
minister Bo Xilai makes a statement during a conference of the sixth World
Trade Organization (WTO) Ministerial Conferences at Hong Kong's Convention
and Exhibition Centre December 14, 2005.
[Reuters] | "This year's GDP will certainly be
over 9 percent," Bo told reporters following World Trade Organisation meetings
in Hong Kong.
The National Development and Reform Commission said last month that gross
domestic product (GDP) would grow about 9.3 percent for all 2005, compared with
9.4 percent growth in the first three quarters of the year.
Although China's economy continued to grow, the country remained "a
through-and-through developing country" and deserved to be treated the same as
other poor countries in the contentious trade talks, Bo said.
On Sunday, the 149 member countries and territories of the WTO saved the
long-running talks from collapse with an interim deal to end farm export
subsidies by 2013 and open rich nation markets a bit wider to the poorest
nations.
Bo said that under the deal, "China's weak agricultural products can win
protection", referring to a formula in the agreement that allows developing
countries to nominate three percent of agricultural product lines for "special
protection".
While China's economy is growing rapidly, it continues to
have a relatively low per-capita GDP and millions of Chinese live on a dollar a
day.
China's National Bureau of Statistics is expected to announce on Tuesday a
revised figure for its 2004 GDP, based on a comprehensive economic census it has
just completed.
A government source told Reuters on Friday the change was expected to show
the Chinese economy in 2004 was actually 16.8 percent larger than previously
recorded.
China's GDP totalled $1.65 trillion in 2004, current data shows, meaning the
revision could bring its size for that year to about $1.93 trillion, while per
capita GDP would increase to about $1,500 from the current $1,268.
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