In the first 20 years of the 21st century, China's economy will grow at an average rate of about 8 percent, said Xu Xianchun, director of the Calculation Department of National Economy under the National Bureau of Statistics Thursday.

Xu made the prediction at the International Forum on Productivity Development in China.

During the next five years, China's economy will keep an annual growth rate of 8.5 percent, and by 2010, China's gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to exceed 26 trillion yuan (US$3.2 trillion), with per capita GDP 19,000 yuan, he said.

From 2010 to 2015, China's GDP is expected to grow at an annualrate of 8 percent, and by 2015, China's GDP is to exceed 42 trillion yuan, with per capita GDP reaching 30,000 yuan (more than US$3,000), he said.

From then on, China will be among the richer ones of middle-income countries according to the 2004 standard of the World Bank, he said.

According to his estimation, by 2020, China's GDP is expected to exceed 60 trillion yuan, with a per capita GDP of over 40,000 yuan.

The main driving force of China's economic growth from 2000 to 2020 will still be the rapid accumulation of capital, he said. Although the capital input contributes less to the GDP growth, its contributing rate will still be as high as 50 percent, he said.

Compared with capital, the contribution of labor input to GDP growth is relatively small due to the change of China's population age structure, he said.

The increase in the labor force will contribute about 6 percent to GDP growth during the next five years, he said.

From the year 2010 on, with the change of age structure of the population, the labor force growth will slow down.

Subsequently, its contribution to GDP growth will also drop to 3 percent or so in the 2011-2015 period, and less than 1 percent in the 2016-2020 period.

The proportion of primary industry will go down gradually, and that of secondary industry will tend to go down, while that of tertiary industry will keep rising, he said.

During the next five years, the proportion of secondary industry will continue to go up, because the growing energy demands lead to the expansion of the energy sector. Higher investment rates lead to the increase of capital goods demands, he said.

From 2010 to 2020, however, the proportion of secondary industry will go down step by step, along with the declining proportions of ore mining and low-technique industries, while the proportion of the tertiary industry will keep rising, along with arising income of households, their growing consumption demands on services, and the expansion of the demands on productive services caused by the rapid development of the industry, he said.

Along with the speedup of industrialization and urbanization in China, the investment rate will tend to decline gradually, while the consumption rate will rise gradually, he said.

By 2020, the investment rate is likely to be around 35 percent,while the consumption rate is expected to exceed 60 percent, he said. 

(Xinhua News Agency November 18, 2005)