China’s top leadership has gone all out to revive confidence and lure foreign investment in intensive meetings with foreign business leaders in recent days, setting out the “win-win opportunities ahead”, as Beijing seeks to achieve a seemingly challenging economic growth target for 2024.
In a rare move, nearly all top-level officials responsible for economic affairs have met or have plans to meet with multinational executives, including during the annual China Development Forum which concluded on Monday, signalling top priority being given to economic growth as multiple headwinds persist.
Following routine speeches and discussions involving Premier Li Qiang and various ministers, Vice-President Han Zheng and Vice-Premier Ding Xuexiang on Monday met with a number of foreign business representatives at the two-day forum in Beijing.
On the same day, chief of staff Cai Qi, China’s fifth-ranking official, met with Stephen Schwarzman, the CEO of private equity giant Blackstone, according to the state-backed Xinhua News Agency.
President Xi Jinping is expected to hold a meeting with a group of business leaders on Wednesday, according to reports, while Zhao Leji, China’s top legislator, will attend the opening ceremony of the Boao Forum for Asia on Thursday.
The high-profile activities send a strong signal that economic development is of central importance to the world’s second-largest economy amid geopolitical tensions with the West and widespread doubts over its growth potential, said Xu Mingqi, a professor of international economics at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.
“The world has been watching if China will keep opening in the next stage, and there has been quite a lot of misinterpretation and distrust,” he said. “Now China is giving a clear message to the world that it will go on opening to foreign investors, and that they will still have many opportunities.” Source: SCMP
