China registered 9-percent gross domestic product (GDP) growth in 2008, said Ma Jiantang, Director of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), at a press conference in Beijing on January 22. This was the lowest growth for China since 2002. In particular, the country's GDP growth in the fourth quarter slumped to 6.8 percent.

Ma said the slowdown was a result of combined effects, including the global financial crisis, the world economic downturn and severe domestic natural disasters.

But the growth rate was still the highest in the world last year. Ma cited statistics from the International Monetary Fund, which said that in 2008, the world average economic growth was 3.7 percent, of which developed economies grew 1.4 percent while emerging and developing economies grew 6.6 percent.

"Therefore, China still outshines them with its 9-percent economic growth," Ma said, adding that the country contributed more than 20 percent to the world's economic growth.

"The fundamentals of China's economy remain unchanged, despite the changing world economic environment," Ma said. "We should be confident about the country's economic outlook."

Among the troika for economic growth, fixed-asset investment increased 25.5 percent year on year, or 0.7 percentage points higher than that of 2007; retail sales of consumer goods rose 21.6 percent, or 4.8 percentage points higher than in 2007; and exports grew 17.2 percent, or 8.5 percentage points lower than in 2007.

Since last November, the government has made macroeconomic policy adjustments and launched a series of policies and measures to boost the economy, including 10 measures to expand domestic demand and promote economic growth, 10 plans to readjust the industrial structure and revitalize industries, as well as a dozen scientific and technological development projects for long-term economic development.

"With the implementation of these policies, China's economy will certainly get out of trouble, and we saw some active changes last December," Ma said.

According to a Xinhua News Agency report, Wang Xiaoguang, an economist at the National Development and Reform Commission, said he believes the 6.8-percent economic growth in the fourth quarter of 2008 does not point to a threat of a hard landing. Instead, it only means that the economic growth fluctuation was rather violent and resulted from slowing external demand and internal regulations caused by the financial crisis, as well as excessive production capacities due to incorrect forecasts by some companies.

Wang believes that China's economy, which had maintained high growth for several years, is unlikely to bottom out in just one year or several quarters. It would be normal for the adjustment period to last two or three years, and there likely would not be severe problems in the Chinese economy, he said. The target of an 8-percent growth rate in 2009 can absolutely be realized, he added.