AFP, Beijing :
China’s economy grew at its slowest pace for nine years in the third quarter, as a campaign to tackle mounting debt, and trade frictions with the US take their toll.
The reading will likely put pressure on Beijing to provide fresh support as investors grow increasingly concerned about the economic outlook, while the yuan and stock markets wallow at four-year lows.
The world’s second largest economy expanded 6.5 percent on-year in July-September, National Bureau of Statistics figures showed, in line with an AFP survey but marking the worst performance since the start of 2009 at the height of the global financial crisis.
It is also well down from the 6.8 percent and 6.7 percent in the previous two quarters but in line with Beijing’s target for the year. “Faced with an extremely complex environment abroad and the daunting task of reform and development at home,” China’s economic growth remained generally steady, said NBS spokesman Mao Shengyong.
China is in the midst of a increasingly bitter trade row with the United States with both sides exchanging tariffs on billions of dollars worth of goods, fanning fears about the impact on the global economy.
The standoff comes at a tough time for Beijing, which is battling to tackle a mountain of debt as credit tightens and infrastructure investment falls. While exports to the US have held up so far, the row has sapped confidence.
“China-US trade frictions have affected the market, but frankly speaking, the psychological impact is greater than the actual impact and China and the US are currently in contact,” said Liu He, China’s top economic policy maker in a Friday interview with official news agency Xinhua intended to reassure markets.
Liu trumpeted a raft of new policies intended to boost the stock market and reaffirmed the importance of China’s private sector, which has suffered from a push to strengthen state-owned enterprises. – Further cooling -The Shanghai composite stock index has fallen by about 30 percent from its January high, while the yuan has slipped about nine percent against the dollar.
