Archive for ‘13th National People’s Congress (NPC)’

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24/05/2020

Xi Focus: “What is people first?” Xi points to how China saves lives at all costs

Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, takes part in a deliberation with his fellow deputies from the delegation of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region at the third session of the 13th National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing, capital of China, May 22, 2020. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

BEIJING, May 23 (Xinhua) — “What is people first?” Chinese President Xi Jinping asked, before offering his own answer when he was talking with lawmakers at the ongoing national legislative session.

“So many people worked together to save a single patient. This, in essence, embodies doing whatever it takes (to save lives),” he said.

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, is a deputy to the 13th National People’s Congress.

During his deliberations with fellow deputies from Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region on Friday, “people” was a keyword.

Xi referred to a story told by another deputy that morning. Luo Jie, from the COVID-19 hard-hit province of Hubei, told reporters at the session how medical workers in his hospital spent 47 days saving an 87-year-old COVID-19 patient.

“About 10 medical workers meticulously took care of the patient for dozens of days, and finally saved the patient’s life,” Xi said. “I am really impressed.”

In the COVID-19 pandemic, health workers around the world got to know the elderly are the most difficult to treat and require the most sophisticated medical resources. China has given every patient equal treatment irrespective of their age or wealth.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, takes part in a deliberation with his fellow deputies from the delegation of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region at the third session of the 13th National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing, capital of China, May 22, 2020. (Xinhua/Huang Jingwen)

In Hubei alone, more than 3,600 COVID-19 patients over the age of 80 have been cured. In the provincial capital Wuhan, seven centenarian patients have been cured.

“We mobilized from around the nation the best doctors, the most advanced equipment and the most needed resources to Hubei and Wuhan, going all out to save lives,” Xi said during the deliberations, adding that the eldest patient cured is 108 years old.

“We are willing to save lives at all costs. No matter how old the patients are and how serious their conditions have become, we never give up,” Xi said.

Xi joined political advisors and lawmakers on Thursday and Friday in paying silent tribute to the lives lost to COVID-19 as the top political advisory body and the national legislature opened their annual sessions.

This year’s government work report said China’s economy posted negative growth in the first quarter of this year, but it was “a price worth paying” to contain COVID-19 as life is invaluable.

“As a developing country with 1.4 billion people, it is only by overcoming enormous difficulties that China has been able to contain COVID-19 in such a short time while also ensuring our people’s basic needs,” the report said.

Epidemic response is a reflection of China’s governing philosophy.

The fundamental goal for the Party to unite and lead the people in revolution, development and reform is “to ensure a better life for them,” Xi said.

The nation’s average life expectancy reached 77 years in 2018, more than double that in 1949, when the people’s republic was founded.

Chinese people are not just living longer but better lives, with more material wealth and broader choices to pursue individual dreams. All rural poor will bid farewell to poverty this year as part of the goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects.

The Party’s long-term governance, Xi said, rests on “always maintaining close bond with the people.”

“We must always remain true to the people’s aspiration and work in concert with them through thick and thin,” Xi said.

Source: Xinhua

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18/02/2020

China may adjust 2020 GDP growth target due to coronavirus, government policy adviser say

  • China was widely expected to announce a gross domestic product (GDP) growth target for 2020 of ‘around 6 per cent’ following 6.1 per cent growth in 2019
  • Zhang Yansheng, who is an adviser to China’s economic policymakers, says ‘there will definitely be adjustments’
(190305) -- BEIJING, March 5, 2019 (Xinhua) -- Xi Jinping (C, front), Li Keqiang (3rd R, front), Wang Yang (3rd L, front), Wang Huning (2nd R, front), Zhao Leji (2nd L, front), Han Zheng (1st R, front) and Wang Qishan (1st L, front) attend the opening meeting of the second session of the 13th National People's Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, capital of China, March 5, 2019. (Xinhua/Li Xueren)
(190305) — BEIJING, March 5, 2019 (Xinhua) — Xi Jinping (C, front), Li Keqiang (3rd R, front), Wang Yang (3rd L, front), Wang Huning (2nd R, front), Zhao Leji (2nd L, front), Han Zheng (1st R, front) and Wang Qishan (1st L, front) attend the opening meeting of the second session of the 13th National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, capital of China, March 5, 2019. (Xinhua/Li Xueren)

China may revise down its annual economic growth target for 2020 in response to the impact of the coronavirus outbreak, but will still not give up the overall target of maintaining economic growth “in a reasonable range”, according to a Chinese government researcher.

The Chinese government has never officially published its goal for 2020, but it is widely expected that the specific gross domestic product (GDP) growth target for 2020

 would be “around 6 per cent”, marking a potential slight slowdown from 6.1 per cent growth in 2019 but enough to achieve Beijing’s grand goal of doubling the size of its economy in 2020 from 2010.
China’s 2020 growth target was originally to be released during Premier Li Keqiang’s government work report at the National People’s Congress, but the March 5 annual parliamentary meeting is set to be postponed due to the coronavirus outbreak.
“There will definitely be adjustments. For the central government, it hasn’t defined what the ‘reasonable range’ should be after the outbreak of coronavirus. People are still watching how the outbreak will develop and influence the economy,” Zhang Yansheng, the chief research fellow at the Beijing-based think tank, the China Centre for
International Economic Exchanges, told the South China Morning Post on Tuesday.

As for the final GDP target figure, we have to be true to facts. The GDP target was not a compulsory requirement but a soft forecast figureZhang Yansheng

“As for the final GDP target figure, we have to be true to facts. The GDP target was not a compulsory requirement but a soft forecast figure – strictly speaking, a forecast figure could be revised three or four times in a year.”
Zhang, though, referenced the fact that 29 of China provincial-level regions, out of a total of 31, had published their 2020 economic growth targets at the Central Economic Work Conference in December.

“The direction and the goals are clear. It’s not the case that people have not known what they should do this year,” added Zhang, who is an adviser to China’s economic policymakers.

President Xi Jinping

has repeatedly said over the last two weeks that China will still strive to achieve its economic and social development goals for 2020 despite the outbreak, which has claimed over 1,800 lives and infected over 70,000 people, and remain on course to build the country into a “comprehensively well-off society”.

China to postpone the year’s biggest political gathering amid coronavirus outbreak
One key aspect of that vision is that China will double the size of its GDP in 2020 from 2010, which would require a minimum 5.6 per cent growth rate in 2020, although Beijing has never clearly defined the full details of the goal.

On Tuesday, Ren Hongbin, vice-chairman of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council, said that the annual production goals and reform tasks set earlier in the year for state-owned enterprises would also not change despite the outbreak.

“The impact of the epidemic is temporary and phased, will not change the long-term positive fundamentals of the Chinese economy,” he said.

We should neither view 6 per cent as a red line nor take doubling the GDP size as a bottom line Song Xiaowu

Before the country fell into an economic standstill around the extended Lunar New Year holiday as the virus spread from the city of Wuhan, economists and analysts have been engaged in a heated debate over whether China needs to keep its growth rate above 6 per cent in 2020.

Song Xiaowu, former president of the China Society of Economic Reform, a state-backed think tank, said at a forum on Saturday that China’s GDP growth rate could drop to 3 per cent in the first quarter and 5 per cent for the whole of 2020.

“We should neither view 6 per cent as a red line nor take doubling the GDP size as a bottom line,” said Song, in a speech published by the China Development Research Foundation, who organised the forum.

Source: SCMP

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20/09/2019

China Focus: China publishes white paper on progress of women’s cause in 70 years

CHINA-BEIJING-SCIO-WOMEN'S CAUSE-WHITE PAPER (CN)

A white paper titled “Equality, Development and Sharing: Progress of Women’s Cause in 70 Years Since New China’s Founding” is released by the State Council Information Office in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 19, 2019. China on Thursday issued a white paper on the progress of women’s cause in the past 70 years since the founding of the People’s Republic of China. TO GO WITH “China publishes white paper on progress of women’s cause in 70 years” (Xinhua/Zhang Yuwei)

BEIJING, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) — China on Thursday issued a white paper on the progress of women’s cause in the past 70 years since the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The white paper, titled “Equality, Development and Sharing: Progress of Women’s Cause in 70 Years Since New China’s Founding,” was released by the State Council Information Office.

The founding of the PRC in 1949 ushered in a new era for women in China, changing their social status from an oppressed and enslaved group in the past thousands of years to masters of their own fate, the white paper said.

As the Chinese nation is rising and growing richer and stronger, Chinese women’s social status has undergone enormous changes, it said.

“The great achievements China has made in the development of women’s cause is attributed to the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC),” said Huang Xiaowei, vice president of the All-China Women’s Federation, at a press conference.

The progress made by Chinese women led by the CPC is not only of considerable significance to China’s national rejuvenation but also a notable contribution to human civilization progress, Huang said.

As China’s development has entered a new era, promoting gender equality and women’s overall development at a higher level not only meets opportunities but also has a long way to go, the white paper said.

Under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, China will always adhere to safeguarding and improving women’s livelihoods, promote women’s all-round development, and lead hundreds of millions of women in working for national rejuvenation, it said.

MORE WORKING WOMEN

China has promulgated laws and regulations to fully protect women’s economic rights and interests, especially the right to equal employment, ensuring equal pay to men and women for equal work and eliminating gender discrimination in employment, the white paper said.

Women account for 40 percent of the labor force in China. In 2017, there were 340 million working women, doubling the figure in 1978.

Women’s job options have greatly expanded. In 2010, 46.8 percent of women worked in industry and service sectors, up 24.8 percentage points from 1982.

HIGHER POLITICAL STATUS

China has drawn up and implemented laws to guarantee that women share equal rights with men to vote, to be elected, and to participate in the administration of state affairs, the white paper said, adding that over the past four decades since the reform and opening-up, new opportunities and channels have been opened to women to participate in politics.

In 2017, women accounted for 52.4 percent of public servants newly-recruited by the central government organs and their affiliates, and the proportion was 44 percent among local governments.

The ratio of women deputies to the 13th National People’s Congress (NPC) was 24.9 percent, 12.9 percentage points higher than that of the first NPC in 1954.

MORE EDUCATED WOMEN

Chinese women’s education level has been dramatically lifted over the past seven decades, according to the white paper.

The illiteracy rate among females aged 15 and above dropped from 90 percent before the founding of the PRC to 7.3 percent in 2017, which was a historic change.

The gender gap in the nine-year compulsory education has been basically eliminated. In 2017, the net primary school enrollment rates of boys and girls were both 99.9 percent while the proportions of girls in primary schools and junior high schools were 46.5 percent and 46.4 percent respectively, 18.5 and 20.8 percentage points higher than those in 1951 respectively

In 2017, the gross high school enrollment rate was 88.3 percent, with girls accounting for 47.7 percent of all students in high schools.

Meanwhile, women accounted for 52.5 percent of students in regular institutions of higher education, 28.4 percentage points higher than in 1978, 32.7 percentage points higher than in 1949.

HEALTHIER WOMEN

Women’s health has further improved in China. Women’s average life expectancy grew to 79.4 years in 2015, an increase of 10.1 years over 1981 and 42.7 years over 1949, according to the white paper.

The maternal mortality rate has fallen 79.4 percent from 88.8 per 100,000 in 1990 to 18.3 per 100,000 in 2018, meaning that China has achieved the United Nations Millennium Development Goals ahead of time.

Source: Xinhua

Posted in 13th National People's Congress (NPC), 70 years, administration of state affairs, All-China Women's Federation, China alert, Communist Party of China (CPC), enslaved group, equal pay to men, Equality, Development and Sharing: Progress of Women's Cause in 70 Years Since New China's Founding, founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC), gender discrimination, illiteracy rate among females, masters of their own fate, maternal mortality rate, oppressed, progress, public servants, publishes, right to equal employment, social status, State Council Information Office, Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, Uncategorized, United Nations Millennium Development Goals, White paper, women's cause, women's economic rights | Leave a Comment »

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