China's GDP growth will be 7.6 per cent this year, enabling the economy to maintain momentum into 2014, the head of the country's top economic planning authority said on Wednesday.
This compares with 7.7 percent growth in 2012 and 9.3 percent in 2011, but it is higher than the yearly target of 7.5 percent, set at the start of 2013.
But Xu Shaoshi, minister of the National Development and Reform Commission, also said that downward pressure on the economy is not to be taken lightly when China's "traditional growth model" faces challenges from a different market environment.
The economy faces many problems. Service industries have still to realize their full potential, strategic emerging industries are in their infancy, and industries such as steel, cement, electrolytic aluminum, plate glass and shipbuilding have overcapacity.
Financial risks are also looming, with a hefty proportion of debt financing concentrated on public infrastructure projects that only generate low returns in the long run. There is already oversupply in the manufacturing and real estate sectors, he said.
Zhu Haibin, chief economist in China at JPMorgan Chase & Co, said a proper, but not too fast, growth rate in the next two years will help the country push forward with economic reforms and to tackle structural imbalances.
GDP growth is likely to continue falling, from 7.6 percent in 2013 to 7.4 percent in 2014, with moderate domestic investment growth, he said.