Conditions and capacity for strong recovery

A senior economic official said the optimized response China has adopted to deal with COVID-19 is expected to have a "J-curve effect" on the economy that will help it gain strong growth momentum in 2023.

"It may cause disruptions to the economy in the short-term, but from the perspective of a whole-year outlook, it is a boon," said Han Wenxiu, executive deputy director of the office of the Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs.

He said that the return to normalcy in life and work will pick up pace in the first half of 2023, especially in the second quarter, with increasing economic vitality unleashed.

"We have the confidence, conditions, and capacity to ensure China's economy takes a turn for the better as a whole," Han said at a think tank forum held after last week's Central Economic Work Conference, at which Chinese leaders decided on the priorities for the country's economic work in 2023.

The tone-setting Central Economic Work Conference was held after China optimized its anti-virus approach to allow home quarantine for asymptomatic and mild cases and cut mass nucleic acid testing, among other measures.

The change was made in accordance with the science and the weakened pathogenicity of the virus. The focus of the epidemic response strategy was thus shifted from infection control to case treatment with the objective of preventing severe cases.

Observers have said with the flow of people and the exchange of goods facilitated, the new policies will gradually revive business activities across a wide range of sectors, including consumer spending, investment and foreign trade. The potential of China's huge market will be unleashed prompting economic output to expand.

"The Chinese economy has strong resilience, great potential, and vitality, and the fundamentals remain sound in the long run," Han said, adding that the optimized epidemic response, coupled with existing and new policy steps, will exert a major positive impact on economic recovery.

China never considers anti-epidemic efforts and economic growth as an either-or choice. Rather, it stresses the importance of coordinating the two in a highly efficient way.

Han said China's economic output for the year 2022 is expected to exceed 120 trillion yuan ($17.2 trillion).

Although the growth rate is likely to undershoot the target set at the beginning of the year, many other development goals can be well accomplished.