BEIJING (Reuters) - China can maintain annual economic growth of around 7 percent over the next five years but there are uncertainties, including weak global trade and high domestic debt, Xinhua news agency quoted President Xi Jinping as saying on Tuesday.
Annual average growth would be no less than 6.5 percent in the next five years to realize the country's goal of doubling 2010 gross domestic product (GDP) and per capita income by 2020, Xinhua earlier quoted Xi as saying.
"It's possible for China's economy to maintain growth of around 7 percent in the future, but it also faces more uncertainties," Xi said, saying that main domestic and foreign research institutions believe China's potential growth could be between 6 and 7 percent in 2016-2020.
Global trade was expected to remain sluggish and growth in China's consumption and investment could slow, and there may be risks from high debt levels, Xi said.
Development over the next five years should not focus just on the pace of growth, but also on the quality and volume, Xi was quoted as saying, explaining a proposal for the country's 13th five-year plan, a blueprint for economic and social development between 2016 and 2020.
Premier Li Keqiang has said that China needs annual growth of at least 6.53 percent over the next five years. [nL3N12T2D6]
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Investors are waiting for the announcement of an economic growth target for the next five years. A communique issued after a key party meeting that discussed the five-year plan said China aims to keep the economy growing at "a medium-to-high rate" to achieve the goal of doubling GDP and per capita income between 2010 and 2020.
Policymakers may face more challenges in deciding the long-term growth target given uncertainties in the global economy and signs of weakness in domestic demand, sources involved in policy discussions say.
The government may favour annual growth of between 6.5 percent and 7 percent for 2016-2020, some sources say. The growth target needs approval from parliament when it meets in March.
Chinese growth dipped to 6.9 percent in the third quarter - the weakest since the global financial crisis, hurt partly by cooling investment and prompting the central bank to cut interest rates and bank reserve requirements again.
Xu Shaoshi, chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the top planning agency, said China had the conditions to keep economic growth at a medium-to-high rate in next five years.
Xu told a news conference that the government would give more attention to employment, incomes and consumer prices than economic growth figures.
(Reporting by Beijing Monitoring Desk and Kevin Yao; Editing by Nick Macfie)