Full transcript of policy briefing of the State Council on Jan 16, 2015

Zhong Shan:

In 2015, we will fully implement the spirit of the 18th CPC National Congress, the third and fourth plenary sessions of the 18th CPC Central Committee and the Central Economic Work Conference, and thoroughly put the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's series of important speeches into effect. We will stick to the overall principle of making progress while keeping stability, actively adapt to the new normal of economic growth and deepen the reform on the commercial front. We will start a new round of high-level opening up which highlights innovation-driven growth and nurtures new development advantages. We will maintain a steady and sound development of internal and external trade as well as international economic cooperation with a view to better serving the whole interest of economic and social progress.

We would like to thank friends from the press for your long-term care and support for work related to commerce. We hope that you will, as always, pay close attention and give more publicity to the development of commerce and share with us your valuable views. Thank you.

Guo Weimin:

Questions.

Asahi Shinbun newspaper:

I have two questions.

Just now, Mr Zhu said that difficulties experienced last year were beyond expectations. My first question is, can you specify in what areas those difficulties arose?

The other question is, we are concerned about the slowdown of China's imports, which were highlighted by Mr Zhong just now. Can you please analyze the reason for this, and predict the situation for 2015 and beyond?

Thank you.

Zhu Zhixin:

I think this question can be explained from two aspects.

Firstly, the impetus of the world economic resurgence is not as strong as we originally expected. At the beginning of last year, we considered that the world economy was at a stage of slow recovery. However, the actual impetus was weaker than what we expected. There are four main features: The first is the difference in each country's policies. Each country adopted different macro policies. The second is intensified geopolitical conflicts; third is the sharp fluctuations in international market prices and fourth is the imbalance of the overall recovery.

Secondly, the Chinese economy entered into a "new normal", so problems long accumulated were revealed as growth slowed. The structural readjustment actually helped reveal them last year.

In all, the challenges we faced in different aspects are obvious. On one side, the resurgence is weaker than expectations; on the other, the challenge is tougher. This caused pressure for an economic downturn. In such circumstances, it was not easy to achieve our expected goals. The achievement should be cherished.