Economic growth rate may fall below 7%: Chinese PM
China’s prime minister says the country may not meet its projected 7-percent economic growth rate due to remarkable slowdown in recent months.
Li Keqiang made the announcement late on Saturday, noting that China's economy does not need to grow seven percent this year as the latest data released last week show the economy is growing at the slowest pace since the financial crisis began, AFP reported.
Li, however, promised that China can still overcome its economic problems.
According to a notice on the Chinese government's website, the prime minister made the remarks during a speech at the Central Party School.
The latest figures have revealed that gross domestic product (GDP) in the world's second-largest economy has grown at just 6.9 percent in the third quarter of this year, recording its slowest rate in six years.
In March, Li predicted that the country’s growth rate for 2015 would stand at about 7.0 percent, as China has started to shift toward a "new normal" driven by domestic consumption instead of exports and government investment.
"First, 6.9 percent is about 7 percent, which is in a reasonable range," Li said, according to a report of the meeting by the People's Daily, adding, "We never said we must defend any target to the death."
His comments come as China's latest GDP figures have added to concerns about the country’s economy with some analysts expressing concern they had been manipulated to understate the gravity of the situation.
Li, however, tried to appear optimistic about the future, saying, "The joint efforts of the whole country and the great potential of China's economy strengthen our confidence in overcoming difficulties."
China’s decades-long boom fuelled by infrastructure investment, exports and debt, made the country a key driver of the global economy.
According to World Bank figures, although China’s economic growth has decreased in recent years, its GDP more than doubled in real terms between 2006 and 2014.
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