CRI听力:World Bank: China Needs Reform to Support Growth

Speaking at a press conference in Beijing, the World Bank chief says that China needs a new economic strategy after three decades of rapid growth to achieve its goal of becoming a high-income society.

Among the measures recommended by the jointly launched report on China's economic development, Zoellick stressed that the dominance of state companies should be reduced to allow more people to share the benefits of such reforms.

"Many experts have the view that SOEs have benefited from very inexpensive financing, preferred positions in the market and they've gained large retained earnings that have led the China savings but haven't necessarily benefited all the Chinese people."

Zoellick acknowledged that reforms might face opposition from entrenched interests that benefit from the old system.

"Will some of the vested interests that benefited from the current structure resist? I suspect they will. They do in the US, Europe and Japan."

However, not all scholars agree with the World Bank on reform measures.

Wei Xing is co-author of "China in 2030: Common Prosperity and a World of Great Harmony", a 200-pages book on the outlook of China's economy.

He suggests that SOEs and private enterprises should enjoy equal opportunities.

"We should improve the investment climate for the private enterprises, including giving them more access to financing opportunities, and better regulatory practices. This is not a zero-sum game, but should be a win-win game for both private enterprises and SOEs. We should level the playing field under the socialist market economy."

According to Wei Xing, The Washington Consensus, written by the World Bank together with the IMF in the 1990s, as an economic recipe for Latin American countries to deal with economic failures, also includes similar suggestions like those outlined in the World Bank's new report for China, such as reducing the size of the state owned economy, and freeing up the interest rates and exchange rates.

"Therefore, we must adapt these suggestions according to the needs of China and implement them step by step. Anyway, the World Bank highlights many of the challenges that the Chinese economy faces; we should understand these challenges and think about our future strategies carefully."

For CRI, this is Ding Lulu.