IMF official: Growth slowdown welcome

IMF Deputy Managing Director Min Zhu, takes part in a discussion on "Challengers of Job-Rich and Inclusive Growth: Growth and Reform Challenges" during the World Bank/IMF Annual Meeting in Washington October 8, 2014. [Photo/Agencies]

Some 12 million jobs were created in China so far this year. "This job creation number is not at all lackluster compared with an 8 or 9 percent GDP growth," Zhu said. China created 13 million jobs in 2013.

Zhu also credited China's economic restructuring with the fact that the service sector contributed more to the GDP than the manufacturing sector this year.

He cautioned that continued restructuring of the real estate sector is still a major task, because the property market makes up such a large chunk of GDP growth.

He noted that the long supply chain of the real estate sector means it is both a difficult and important task.

"As the world's second-largest economy, China's economic stability is especially important to global economic growth," Zhu said.

Jorge Mariscal, chief investment officer for emerging markets at UBS AG, said: "China's slowdown is a healthy correction, in many ways an engineered slowdown. So far, this rate of decline of the economy isn't so concerning as to justify a very aggressive stimulus program, whether fiscal or monetary."

Overall, China's slowing momentum is seen as positive rather than alarming. According to Malaysia's central bank Governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz, moderating growth will make it more sustainable, which benefits all of Asia.

Markus Rodlauer, deputy director of the IMF's Asia and Pacific department, said in a recent speech that 1 percentage point lower growth in China would translate to about 0.1 percentage point less global growth, with larger impacts on selected economies.

China and other emerging markets and developing countries have accounted for more than 80 percent of world growth since 2008. "Led by Asia, and China in particular, we expect that they will continue to drive global activity," Lagarde said last week.

Zhu said: "I hope the Chinese economy will continue to grow in a sustainable way."

Kim, the World Bank president, described China's efforts to move up the value chain and focus economic growth more on consumption and services as being "very difficult things to do".

Noting that China's economic growth has moderated from a high rate of 10 percent, Kim said the important thing is that China stays committed to the reform process.

"We believe that the reform process and moving toward a different growth model are what China needs to do."

Kim described moving to a different growth model while maintaining a particular growth rate to create jobs as being a delicate balance.

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