China has set an annual growth target of “about 5 percent”, promising to make domestic demand its main economic driver as an escalating trade war with the United States hit exports.
The headline growth figure announced by Premier Li Qiang at an annual Communist Party conclave on Wednesday also included a rare rise in fiscal funding, allowing China’s budget deficit to reach 4 percent this year as it battles stuttering employment for young people, low consumer demand and a property sector debt crisis.
