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China faces challenges from foreign investors
(AP)
Updated: 2006-01-26 15:32
When China joined the World Trade Organization four years ago, it feared the
"wolf" had come -- foreign investors ready to eat up its economy. A year later,
China and the wolf were dancing together. Now, they're married, but a senior
Bank of China executive said this does not mean the marriage will last forever
in bliss.
A Chinese shareholder stares at the mainboard
in Shanghai Stock Exchange January 5, 2006. China's shares rose 1.4
percent on Thursday as investors took heart from news that foreign
strategic investors would be allowed to buy shares in domestically listed
companies. The benchmark Shanghai composite index closed at 1,197.269
points, after climbing 1.71 percent on Wednesday.
[Reuters] |
Zhu Min, the state-owned bank's
executive assistant president, noted that 50 percent of marriages in the U.S.
end in divorce and what happens in the future will depend on how China and
foreign investors cooperate in meeting difficult challenges, especially in the
newly opened financial sector.
"When we joined the WTO, we always talked about the wolf has come, we're
scared to death," Zhu said Wednesday. "A year later, we talked about dancing
with the wolf ... Now we marry ... the wolf" and the situation is very
different.
China's booming economy and prospects for investment featured high on the
first day's agenda at the World Economic Forum, the annual gathering of the
world's top business and government leaders.
Zhu predicted that China's economy will grow between 8.8 percent and 9.3
percent this year "because the whole economy is pretty healthy and strong ...
domestic consumption really picked up and domestic construction is very strong."
That would make it the world's fourth largest, behind the U.S., Japan and
Germany.
But Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of the standing committee of the National
People's Congress, said in China's new five-year plan to be approved in March
"our goal is around 8 percent" growth to allow for greater investment in
improving life for the country's 1.3 billion people.
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