Full coverage: 95 years of glory

The "New Normal" theory elaborated by President Xi Jinping will likely be remembered as a hallmark in Chinese history. Economic experts say a medium-to-high growth, constantly improved and upgraded economic structure is very important for long-term growth. For the twelfth episode of CCTV's "95th Anniversary of the CPC: Serving the People", we spoke with experts and former high-ranking officials for a view on this historic beginning. 

Jong-Wha Lee, former chief economists of Asia Development Bank and director of Asiatic Research Institute of Korea University said, "If we look at the historical evidence of the economic growth across economies, particular China’s past growth, certainly the supply side is very important for long-term growth. So President Xi’s initiative is on the right point for the China’s sustainable growth. "

Ricardo Melendez, chief executive of International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development said, "The Chinese consumers themselves they prefer to buy clothes made in Europe for instance than clothes made in China, but China is the largest factory of clothing of the world. So why is this? And it may have to do with the fact that again quality wise. There is a need for improvement and there is a need for more investment in that respect rather than quantity, as it was in the past. That’s part of again climbing up the value chain in production. So China can compete with those world brands at the same level. Looking through the 13th Five-year Plan, I think there are some elements there that are they write it again to that objective. And so I am also optimistic in that sense, I think that, you said it , China has a very large market, and growing market, and that market is of great interest to foreign competitors, and again the competition is which drive that China’s upgrading and a better participation of Chinese brands in the global market. "

Ajit Ranade, senior president and chief economist of Aditya Birla Group, also member of CII China Core Group, said, "The thing is Chinese’s growth has depended on exports, but the export markets in western economies, are slowing down and therefore there is a rethink about whether this mix of the three drivers should be rebalanced. Of course when President Xi Jinping came and the new policy in the 13th Five-year Plan, they all contemplate to rebalance the economy or they called harmonious society. So rebalancing means increasing the share of consumption, increasing the importance of domestic markets, decreasing the importance of investment spending, and decreasing the dependency on export alone. The role of innovation of course as an growth driver comes from the supply side, so consumption plus investment plus export, this is the demand side of the picture and I recommend. If you look at economic growth from structural supply side, it’s an consequence of innovation, productivity, technological change, and all that."
 
Fakhruddin Ahmed, former Prime Minister of Bangladesh said, "China grew rapidly during the last more than two decades, and its growth does slow down. But I think China is adjusting by its own policy decision. The growth path that China is embarking now will allow it to improve the quality of growth to more sustainable levels and I do believe that this 'New Normal' that we are talking about will also take China to continue its march towards further improvement in the living standards of the people and better quality of life. And more sustainable is a more important factor in my mind."