NOV. 9, 2014
BEIJING — President Xi Jinping told a gathering of Asia-Pacific business executives Sunday not to worry about the Chinese economy, saying there were risks but not so many as to lose sleep over.
“Some worry whether China’s growth rate will slow down further, or whether China can overcome the obstacles — risks are indeed there, but they’re not that scary,” Mr. Xi said at the C.E.O. Summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting.
Mr. Xi described a lower growth rate as the “new normal,” saying that annual growth above 7 percent still placed China among the world’s top-performing countries in speed and size. China’s economy is forecast to grow at a rate of 7.5 percent this year, the weakest pace since 1990.
Projecting confidence about China’s influence beyond its borders, Mr. Xi said he wanted to create “an Asia-Pacific dream for our people,” an idea that dovetailed with Beijing’s push at the APEC summit for a new free-trade area for the Asia-Pacific that aimed to simplify rules under the more than 70 trade pacts in the region.
As the host of the APEC summit this year, China wanted the trade and foreign ministers to agree to a feasibility study for the new regional free-trade area that would represent a signature project introduced by China at the summit.
The United States Trade Representative, Michael Froman, described the idea of a Chinese proposal for a free trade area in the entire Asia Pacific area as far off compared with the immediacy of the Trans Pacific Partnership, which Washington has been negotiating with 11 countries.
“It’s a reaffirmation of a long-term aspiration for the region that’s to be achieved through other ongoing negotiations,” Mr. Froman said to reporters at the Beijing Convention Center.
In the lead up to the summit, the Obama administration objected to such a study, saying it would interfere with the completion of the United States-led Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact that Washington sees as the centerpiece of its Asia policy.
On Saturday, the APEC trade and foreign ministers agreed to a compromise: Over the next two years, APEC would conduct a “collective strategic study” for a free-trade area in the Asia-Pacific region. Also, they said there would be no target date for the completion of the area.
“The Chinese wanted to sound ambitious and said ‘let’s launch a feasibility study, and we can reach this thing by 2025,”’ said a senior Obama administration official, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter. “This would be their key initiative to bring order to the 75 trade pacts in the region.”
The Obama administration, which has been working on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a pact that does not include China, did not want any distraction from completing the partnership, the official said. Moreover, China’s idea of a regional free-trade area would have lower standards on such items as intellectual property than the Trans- Pacific plan, the official said.
“The United States does not want disruption to the T.P.P.,” the official said.
In the face of a rising China, the Trans-Pacific Partnership has been promoted by the administration since 2009 as the centerpiece of its effort to show strength in Asia. Any hopes to complete the negotiations for the partnership, which covers environmental and labor standards, by the initial goal of the end of this year were abandoned.
The United States trade representative, Michael Froman, met with trade ministers involved in negotiations for the Trans-Pacific plan on Saturday in Beijing.
There was “significant progress” and a “lot of momentum” toward a conclusion of the pact, Mr. Froman said Sunday.
The biggest sticking point remained Japan’s heavily protected agricultural sector, which Prime Minister Shinzo Abe promised the Obama administration would be opened up under terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
“We’ve made progress, but we’re not there yet,” Mr. Froman said.
President Obama, due to arrive in Beijing on Monday for the APEC summit, is set to meet with the leaders of the 11 other countries involved in the partnership.
Mr. Obama, who visited Japan last spring, is not expected to meet separately with Mr. Abe, whose main goal at the summit is to meet with President Xi.
The meeting between the Chinese and Japanese leaders, which is likely to take place Monday, would be a first step toward repairing the Cold War-style standoff between China and Japan since the two leaders came to power.
Despite the drawn out negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the administration got a shot in the arm for completion of the pact last week when Republicans on Capitol Hill said they would vote to approve Trade Promotion Authority legislation.
Such authority eases approval of complicated trade deals by stipulating that lawmakers cannot make changes to a trade pact once it has been signed by the participants.
“The next time the president calls on Congress to approve Trade Promotion Authority legislation, he’ll hear a resounding ‘yes’ from the new majority party,” said Senator John Barrasso, Republican of Wyoming.
In another effort to showcase its economic heft during APEC, China announced Saturday that it would contribute $40 billion to a Silk Road fund designed to finance infrastructure linking China to Central and South Asia, the Middle East and Europe.
The projects would include railways and roads covering territory that centuries ago linked traders in China to the Mediterranean, said Xinhua, the state-run news agency.
original source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/10/business/international/no-fears-for-china-economy-xi-jinping-says.html