Foreign economists, media positive about China's new Five-Year Plan

BEIJING - Foreign economists and media are positive about the ideology of development contained in China's newly-approved 13th Five-Year Plan (2016-2020) and the targets it set for China's economic and social development for the next five years.

China has provided the world with many new opportunities due to its policies to deepen reforms and make innovation in the past five years, the Brazilian website Vermelho said.

The innovative development of the internet, particularly, has penetrated all sectors of the the society and the industry, and has directly changed China's economic and social structure, said Zhou Zhaocheng, adjunct associate professor of Nanyang Technological University.

Therefore, the policy on innovative development of the internet, adopted in the 13th Five-Year Plan, will have a far-reaching influence on China's future economic development, Zhou added.

Creating a new "ecological civilization" rather than focusing on GDP growth will become a new priority of the Chinese government toward 2020, US economist Laurence J. Brahm told Russia's Sputnik News Agency on Tuesday.

The Communist Party of China (CCP) will herald an era of "ecological civilization", calling for a new type of growth that is more holistic and balanced than focusing on high growth industrial development as seen in the past decade, Brahm explained.

"Opening up the domestic market is a powerful tool of reform that can benefit China," economist and deputy director of the Australia-China Relations' Institute James Laurenceson told Xinhua.

Though there are some sectors that remain protected and these sectors will be a focus of reform in the coming five years, Laurenceson expected that lower barriers to entry for private sector firms, both domestic and foreign, will be a major focus of the 13th five-year plan.

A growth rate of less than 7 percent, or even about 6.5 percent, is an appropriate target that will still make China a major contributor to global economic growth, said Nicholas Lardy, senior fellow with Peterson Institute for International Economics.

In Thailand, Tang Zhimin, director of China ASEAN Studies under Bangkok-based Panyapiwat Institute of Management, told Xinhua a more open China creates more opportunities for goods, services and investment from other countries.

China's 13th Five-Year Plan targets not economic growth, but the comprehensive development of economy, politics, society, culture and ecological civilization, Tang said.

The Chinese people are leading a stable life with the government guaranteeing employment and a stable pricing, said Kiyoyuki Seguchi, research director of Japanese think tank Canon Institute for Global Studies.

He added that if China continues to adhere to its policies based on a "new normal" featuring slower but healthy growth, the people's livelihood will continue to be improved.