China to see crucial but complicated year: premier

BEIJING - The year of 2010 will be a crucial but complicated year for China's economic development, Premier Wen Jiabao said at the parliament annual session Friday.

"This is a crucial year for the country to continue fighting against the global financial crisis while maintaining a steady and comparatively fast economic development and accelerating the transformation of economic growth pattern," Wen said while delivering the government work report to the National People's Congress.

"Although the development environment this year may be better than last year, we still face a very complicated situation," he said.

Many uncertainties and challenges, both domestic and global, remain this year, including grim employment situation, overcapacity in some sectors, increasing trade protectionism and food security issue, Wen noted.

The country will continue implementing the proactive fiscal policy and moderately loose monetary policy this year while enhancing the focus and flexibility of the policy according to new conditions, he said.

"We will work to balance the work of maintaining stable and comparatively fast economic growth, adjusting economic structure and preventing possible inflation," Wen said.

Last year was the most difficult year for China's economic development since the beginning of the new century, he said.

As the first country emerging from the global economic downturn, China reported an annual economic growth of 8.7 percent in 2009. The rate was lower than the 9.6-percent growth in 2008 and annual double-digit increases in the 2003-2007 period.

China's quarterly economic growth accelerated as the government' s economic stimulus package started to pay off. The national economy rose 6.2 percent in the first quarter last year, 7.9 percent in the second quarter, 9.1 percent in the third and 10.7 percent in the fourth.

However, "we must not interpret the economic recovery as a fundamental improvement in the economic situation," Wen said. "We need to be on high alert for potential dangers, make full use of favorable conditions and positive factors, strive to resolve problems, make even more thorough preparations to deal with risks and challenges of all kinds."