China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) on Wednesday submitted on behalf of the State Council a report on the implementation of the country's 2007 national economic and social development plan and on the 2008 draft development plan to the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature.
Following are some facts and figures from the 37-page report:
ACHIEVEMENTS IN 2007:
-- China's GDP reached 24.6619 trillion yuan, up 11.4 percent from the year before.
-- Total national revenue for 2007 was 5.13 trillion yuan, an increase of 32.4 percent.
-- Energy consumption per unit of GDP fell by 3.27 percent, a larger drop than that of the year before.
-- A total of 431.8 billion yuan from the central government was spent on agriculture, rural areas, and farmers, a year-on-year increase of 80.1 billion yuan.
-- A bumper harvest yielded a total grain output of 501.5 million tons, 3.5 million tons more than the previous year, the fourth consecutive annual rise.
-- A mechanism for ensuring adequate funding for rural compulsory education was implemented throughout the country, enabling 150 million rural primary and middle school students to be exempted from paying tuition and miscellaneous fees and to receive textbooks required by the state free of charge.
-- A total of 730 million farmers are now participants in the new system of rural cooperative medical care and the system now covers 86 percent of the country's counties.
-- A total of 55.6 billion yuan from the central government allocations for development projects was spent in the western region, 4.1 billion yuan more than the previous year.
-- Per capita net income for rural residents rose by 9.5 percent and per capita disposable income for urban residents by 12.2 percent in real terms.
-- The country's export and import volume reached 2.1738 trillion, up 23.5 percent from the year before.
TARGETS FOR 2008
-- GDP growth at about 8 percent.
-- Urban employment expanded by 10 million new jobs and urban registered unemployment rate at about 4.5 percent.
-- A fairly fast increase of both the incomes of urban and rural residents, with a 6 percent rise or more of per capita net income of rural residents in real terms.
-- CPI rise at around 4.8 percent.
-- Slowdown in trade surplus growth and steady expansion of China's external investment.
(Xinhua News Agency March 5, 2008)