China urged to guard against unbalanced economic development ( 2003-10-28 15:03) (Xinhua)
China's central bank, the People's Bank of China, is urging further
substantial efforts to alleviate the heavily unbalanced development of the
country's economy.
In a report released Monday on the execution of monetary policy in the third
quarter, the bank cautioned against four major imbalances, namely the imbalance
between investment and consumption; urban and rural development; regional
development; and development of different industrial lines.
According to the report, the gap between increase rates for investment and
consumption has further widened as figures show that retail sales rose 8.6
percent year-on-year in the previous three quarters in comparison with the 30.5
percent year-on-year growth in investment on fixed assets.
Urban development far exceeded the development in rural areas and per-capita
income for urban residents was much higher than their rural counterparts, noted
the report.
Half of the workforce, who engaged in agricultural production, contributed to
only 15.4 percent of the gross domestic product ( GDP) in year 2002.
The report acknowledged that the pace of development in China's eastern areas
is much faster than in the mid-western regions. It cited figures to prove that
both east-central and central-west GDP gaps had widened from 1999 to 2002.
In 2002, per-capita GDP in China's east region reached 16,490 yuan (1,987 US
dollars), more than double the national average. However, the figures for the
central and western regions stood at 12 percent and 30 percent below the
average.
The unbalanced growth of different industrial lines was mainly caused by
repetitive construction covering the production of traditional products like
iron, steel, cement and automobiles and also irrational development of real
estate projects, said the report.
Moreover, the report warned against excessive reliance on new industries like
electronic information, software development, new materials and pharmaceuticals.
