Chinese Leaders Set Out Priorities, Citing Challenges
Communist Party Produces
Ambitious List to Address
Social, Economic Inequities
BEIJING -- In a rare admission of the challenges facing China amid growing social unrest, a high-level Communist Party meeting described the next five years as a critical transition period during which the country should "grasp opportunities to...seriously solve outstanding conflicts and problems on the road ahead."
In a communiqué issued at the end of a four-day meeting and which bore the clear mark of party chief Hu Jintao, the party's powerful Central Committee ticked off an ambitious list of priorities for the government to address some of the social inequities and uneven development after a quarter-century of pell-mell market changes.
The goals include improving energy efficiency and environmental protection, strengthening social-security networks, education and health care -- as well as raising the living standards of farmers and the poor, Chinese Central Television said in its national evening news broadcast.
The next five years take on "significant historic status as a transition period," CCTV quoted the communiqué as saying. "We need to turn economic and social development onto a track of comprehensive, harmonious and sustainable development."
On China's relationship with the outside world, the party document said Beijing should continue to improve its policy of opening up to the outside and actively and effectively use foreign investment, CCTV said. It also noted that China would rely mostly on its own strength to develop and called for China to nurture a batch of domestic companies with their own intellectual property and independent brands, instead of relying on foreign technology and innovation.
The plenum also approved a five-year blueprint laying out economic and social-development priorities for 2006 to 2010, CCTV said. The largely rubber-stamp national legislature is expected to approve the plan at its annual meeting next spring.
It remains unclear whether Mr. Hu's government will be able to meet such wide-ranging goals. Even as Beijing has sought to cool overheated growth in sectors such as real estate and to rein in environmentally damaging industries such as mining, local governments eager to promote growth and profits often flout central-policy initiatives.
The plenum communiqué underscores Beijing's concern about rising popular discontent sparked by a growing wealth gap, rampant corruption and surging health-care and educational costs. For years, many economists and Chinese officials thought the country's key to stability was simply maintaining a high-enough growth rate to generate jobs and opportunities; some Chinese could get rich first and others could catch up later. But the increasing numbers of large-scale, violent protests in the past couple of years have sparked concern at the top levels of government that more must be done to address the uneven growth.
Chinese leaders also worry that the country won't be able to sustain economic growth without more efficient use of resources. In a commentary yesterday, the official People's Daily newspaper noted that while China's gross domestic product accounted for 4% of the global total, its consumption of primary energy sources accounted for 12% of the global total; freshwater, 15%; aluminum, 25%; and cement, 50%.
"The old road of high input, high consumption and low output that boosted China's economic growth has come to its end," the commentary said.
The plenum statement reiterated the country's intention to stick to a path of "peaceful development, which means we'll push for a peaceful environment to develop ourselves and also promote world peace through our development," CCTV said. Some politicians in the U.S. and other countries have voiced concern that China's emergence as a global force could present a threat to world peace.
中国政府制定未来5年发展规划
中国共产党为期4天的高层会议将下一个五年描绘为关键的转型期，称国家必须紧紧抓住机遇，认真解决前进道路上面临的突出矛盾和问题。坦言在社会不稳定因素增强的形势下所面临的挑战，这在中国还是比较罕见的。
在会后发布的中国共产党十六届五中全会公报中，中央委员会列出了一份雄心勃勃的政府工作重点清单，以解决25年来市场改革进程中出现的一些社会不平等和经济发展不均衡的问题。
下一个时期的发展目标包括提高能源使用效率和改善环境保护状况，加强社会保障体系、教育和医疗保健体系，以及提高农民和贫困人口生活水平，这是中国中央电视台(Chinese Central Television)在晚间的全国新闻播报中宣布的。
下一个五年“具有承前启后的重要历史地位，” 中央电视台援引公报说，“我们要把经济社会发展切实转入全面协调可持续发展的轨道。”
根据中央电视台报道，公报表示，在中国与外部世界的关系上，中国应当继续推行对外开放的政策，积极有效地利用外资。但是它也表示，中国应当主要依赖自身力量来发展经济，培养具有自有知识产权和独立品牌的国内企业，而不是依赖于外国技术和创新。
此次会议还通过了2006年至2010年国民经济和社会发展规划的建议，中央电视台表示。预计中国的立法机构全国人民代表大会将在明年春季的年会上批准这项计划。
胡锦涛领导的中国政府能否完成这项内容广泛的计划，目前还不得而知。在中央政府力求给房地产等增长过热行业降温、控制采矿等环境污染严重行业的同时，急于促进当地经济增长以期从中谋利的地方政府常常无视中央政策妄自行动。
举例来说，中央政府将2005年经济增长控制在8%左右的目标就没能实现。周一，国家发展和改革委员会(National Development and Reform Commission)公布，中国经济今年前9个月增长9.4%，预计全年增长9.2%。
十六届五中全会公报凸显出中国政府对贫富差距增大、腐败现象孳生、医疗和教育成本激增等问题引发社会不满情绪加剧的担忧。多年来，许多经济学家和中国官员一直以为，社会稳定的关键是维持足够高的经济增长率以创造充足的就业机会；部分中国人可以先富起来，其他人迎头赶上。但最近几年，大规模抗议示威活动的增多引起了政府高层的担心，他们觉得必须加大力度解决经济增长不平衡问题。
中国领导人还担心，如果不提高资源利用效率，持续的经济增长（这对创造就业机会和抑制潜在社会不稳定因素起著至关重要的作用）可能难以为继。官方报纸《人民日报》周一发表评论称，中国的国内生产总值占全球的4%，但主要能源产品的消耗量占全球的12%，淡水、铝和水泥的消耗量分别占15%、25%和50%。
评论说，高投入、高消耗、低产出的中国经济增长之路已经走到了尽头。
十六届五中全会公报重申，中国打算“坚定不移地走和平发展道路，就是要透过争取和平的国际环境来发展自己，又要透过自身的发展来促进世界和平”。美国和其他国家的一些政界人士此前已经表达了担忧，即中国成长为一支全球力量可能对世界和平造成威胁。
