Data about China’s growth and the image the country is trying to portray on the international forums are contrary.
On one hand, the data on employment and GDP point towards a crisis. But Chinese authorities are still trying to put up a positive image on international forums, The Singapore Post reported.
The National Bureau of Statistics figures shows that retail sales had fallen by 1.8 per cent in December 2022 compared to the figures from the previous year. Overall the country’s retail sales have fallen by 0.2 per cent, the report by The Singapore Post claimed.
In contrast with this data, the experts in the country tried to cover it up. The report by The Singapore Post quoted Vice-Premier Liu He who spoke at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos saying that “the economy will get back to normal quickly”, according to the same report.
The Vice-Premier used the Davos platform to first justify President Xi Jinping’s Zero Covid policy and then said that the economy had not been badly affected because of the strict lockdowns. The chaos in China was because of the sudden spurt in Covid infections after the Zero Covid policy was ended, “which somehow is beyond our expectations”.
Although the United States (US) treasury officials were quoted in the Singapore report mentioning that the two countries will exchange views on macroeconomic developments. The same was said by the Chinese Commerce Ministry which said that they also wanted both countries to “strengthen macroeconomic and financial policy coordination”.