(Two Sessions Express) Justin Yifu Lin: Setting economic growth targets this year is equivalent to a "baton"

  China News Agency, Beijing, March 4th (Reporter Pang Wuji) In 2022, should China set a specific growth target for the economy?

  Lin Yifu, member of the Standing Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and dean of the Institute of New Structural Economics at Peking University, said in an interview with a reporter from China News Agency that personally, he still advocates setting growth goals.

Because setting growth targets is equivalent to a "baton", it can make people feel where the government is leading the efforts of the whole society.

He believes that China has good growth potential and good resources. After setting growth goals, it can increase confidence.

  Justin Yifu Lin believes that China's economic development has two major advantages: "advantage of latecomers" and "advantage of changing lanes and overtaking".

In his view, no matter how the international situation evolves, as long as China maintains its determination, has confidence in the future, and makes good use of these two major advantages, its economic development can still be maintained at a reasonable and relatively high speed.

  First of all, as a country in the catching-up stage, China has the "later advantage", which is an important space for China's development.

In some traditional industries, there is still a gap between China and the world frontier.

The gap represents room for growth, and we can continue to use introduction, digestion, and absorption as a source of innovation.

  In addition, it is the "advantage of changing lanes and overtaking" in the new economic field.

The characteristic of the fourth industrial revolution is that the development cycle of many new products is very short: as long as 12 months or 18 months, the products can be iterated, and their research and development investment is mainly human capital.

China is a large country with a population of 1.4 billion, with abundant human capital, a large domestic market and complete industrial facilities.

In this new economic field with a short R&D cycle, including digital economy, Internet, artificial intelligence, etc., China and other developed countries not only stand on the same starting line, but also have advantages that other developed countries do not have.

  Talking about his expectations for China's economic growth this year, Justin Yifu Lin pointed out that it is entirely possible for China to achieve a growth rate of around 6% or even more than 6% this year.

(over)