The Midterm Reform of China's Economic Structure

Abstract

1. The design for the next stage of reform should be based on reality and on a comprehensive appraisal of the current situation in China. In the past nine years, we have already made great achievements, and there is indeed a good opportunity for further progress as we enter the year of the dragon [1988]. In 1987, the nation's production, construction, circulation, foreign trade, and so forth were all better than predicted. There were some signs that growth and stability were beginning to be unified and that the enlivening of the microeconomic sector and better control over the macro-economic sector were spurring each other on. What encouraged people even more was that after the Thirteenth Party Congress [in November 1987], there was greater unity between higher and lower levels of society …, greater fervor for development and reform, and renewed confidence. Both subjective and objective circumstances created good conditions for stabilizing the economy and deepening reform. We must match the logical progression of the situation and, step by step, raise development and reform to a new stage. This is the basis for studying the "three, five, eight" [year] midterm reform outline.