Homegrown demand drives Chinese economy forward
Global Times
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China's GDP growth reached 6.8 percent year-on-year in the first half of this year. International analysts believe that the Chinese economy has maintained its momentum in the context of deleveraging and curbing financial risks. The most imminent factors in the second half of this year would be the China-US trade war and the continuation of deleveraging, but they won't lead the Chinese economy to a hard landing. China has enough space to take initiative and pursue better macro-economic performance. 

It's increasingly clear that the Chinese economy develops in a bid to promote and satisfy public demand for a better life. China's capacity is growing to meet the expanding demand. Whether China's quarterly GDP grows or drops even 0.1 percentage point attracts high attention. But a bigger challenge for China is to create more demand and ensure manufacturing keeps up with the trend. 

As for the trade war, the US in some sense hopes to monopolize Chinese market demand so that bilateral economic and trade cooperation can further accumulate China's strategic dependence on the US. 

Given the Chinese government's capacity of social mobilization and organization, however the China-US trade war goes, it won't alter the development direction of Chinese society. 

The trade war will only produce a limited negative influence on the Chinese economy. 

The growing demand in both scope and quality of the Chinese market is decided by Chinese people's collective pursuit for a better life. As long as the overall environment stays stable, Chinese people will continue striving for a better life and a more secure future. They are also eager to provide the same for their children. 

Such growing demand not only provides a steady flow of driving force for the Chinese economy, but boosts world economic growth and enables China to have more leverage in handling foreign relations. Hence expanding domestic demand is a critical source of power for China amid rampant trade protectionism. 

In this context, countries like the US will find it unrealistic to monopolize the supply for quality products in China and the only feasible option is to reach a compromise with China on trade. We should be confident in this. 

Chinese people want better education and healthcare, more reliable care for the elderly, safer food and better living conditions. This creates enormous space for the Chinese economy to meet those needs. The Chinese market will maintain healthy and dynamic growth. 

Chinese society must remain confident in its sizable economy. We need to prevent incidents like the trade war from impacting our economic system and causing negative chain reactions. 

New economic figures indicate that the Chinese economy is operating within a stable range and will be resilient to shocks. We have to ensure its resilience overruns any negative impact that arises. 

Efforts are needed to prevent bureaucracy and formalism from hampering growth, and to enable key links in the economy to sustain industrial upgrade and development momentum. This will curb some potential risks from evolving into real challenges.