CCTV9英语新闻：US media reactions on China's economic growth target

 The U.S. media is paying close attention to this year’s Two Sessions in China. Following Premier Li Keqiang’s announcement that China’s economic growth target for 2016 is between six-and-a-half and seven percent, there was immediate reaction in U.S. papers and on social media.

 

The New York Times compares China’s economic reform plan to what former U.S. President Ronald Reagan did. According to the paper:

 

“China President Xi Jinping is calling his next economic initiative ‘supply-side structural reform,’ a deliberate slogan referring to tax cuts and deregulation advocated by conservative Western leaders in the 1980s.”

 

The Associated Press published an article on China’s military budget that states:

 

“China will boost defense spending by about seven to eight percent in 2016, the smallest increase in six years, reflecting slowing growth in the world's second-largest economy and a drawdown of 300-thousand troops as Beijing seeks to build a more streamlined, modern military.”

 

China's efforts to curb pollution are also the focus of the media. The Wall Street Journal reports.

 

According to monitoring data from the U.S. Embassy, which measures harmful particulate matter, the air quality index at one point on Friday exceeded 400, a measure it considers “hazardous.” A reading of 50 represents good air quality.

 

And on social media, China’s poverty relief goal has been considered very ambitious. One Twitter user wrote “Chinese Premier Li says (he wants) to lift over 10 million rural residents out of poverty (in 2016)”; and Twitter user John Ross said, “China (has) lifted 725 million people out of poverty, (that’s) more than (the) entire population of the EU.”

 

And in Premier Li’s report, China sets a cap for energy consumption for the first time.

 

Twitter user André Hock retweeted the report saying: “China’s 6.5% economic growth projections for 2016-20; Target to cut energy intensity by 15% same period.”

 

If you want to be involved in the ongoing Two Sessions, here is your chance.

 

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