CPC leadership sets tone for economic policy

Political Bureau meeting highlights stability as top priority in coming year

China will strive to stabilize the fundamentals of its macro economy next year, with steps to make its fiscal policies more efficient, targeted and sustainable and promote the steady recovery of consumer spending, the core leadership of the Communist Party of China said on Monday.

The meeting of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee set the tone for the nation's economic policies next year, highlighting stability as the top priority and the need to continue to implement a proactive fiscal policy and a prudent monetary policy.

Xi Jinping, general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, presided over the meeting.

The nation will expedite steps to foster a new development paradigm, deepen reform and opening-up across the board, coordinate efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and sustain socioeconomic growth and maintain its major economic indicators within a proper range, policymakers said.

The nation must ensure that its macro policies are prudent and effective, with monetary policy being flexible and appropriate in terms of maintaining liquidity at a reasonable and adequate level, they said.

The meeting reiterated the importance of carrying out the strategy of boosting domestic demand, including measures to proactively expand effective investment.

Priority must be given to energizing market players, and greater emphasis must be placed on the protection of intellectual property rights, they said, adding that the nation must continue to lift the core competitiveness of the manufacturing sector and enhance the resilience of supply chains.

As for the real estate sector, the policymakers pledged to move forward with the development of affordable housing projects in a bid to enable the sector to meet reasonable demand from homebuyers.

China will continue to focus on breakthroughs in core technologies, strengthen its national strategic force in science and technology, bolster the principal role of businesses in conducting innovation and facilitate a favorable relationship between science and technology, industries and the financial sector, according to the meeting.

In moving forward with reform and opening-up, the nation must effectively push forward major regional strategies and strategies for coordinated regional development, pilot reforms to promote the market-based allocation of productive forces and expand opening-up at a higher level.

The policymakers underscored that China's social policies must ensure that the basic living needs of the public are met, adding that the employment-first policy and the new third-child policy must be fully carried out.

The nation will continue to work toward the unified national management of pension funds and improve the mechanism under which residents obtain public services based on where they actually live, they said.

The meeting's participants called for sound and targeted measures to contain and prevent COVID-19 outbreaks, saying that the supply of coal, electricity, oil and gas must be guaranteed to meet the public's demand for heating in the winter.

It is important to conduct sound preparatory work for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics to ensure that the nation will host streamlined, safe and splendid Olympic Games, they said.

The Political Bureau meeting was held days after the CPC Central Committee convened a symposium with non-CPC members to solicit their opinions on economic policies.

While presiding over the symposium, Xi stressed that the upcoming 20th National Congress of the CPC next year would be a major event in the political life of the Party and State.

He highlighted the complex situation facing the Chinese and global economies, and called for efforts to act on the general principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability and faithfully, accurately and comprehensively carrying out a new development philosophy.