Chinese
President Jiang Zemin reiterated during a recent tour of northeast China
that China will unswervingly take economic development as its central task.
The fundamental task of
socialism is to develop the productive forces, and maintenance of the
vitality of the Communist Party of China (CPC) serves as a guarantee for
China's modernization drive, said Jiang, who is also the general secretary
of the CPC Central Committee.
"We are confronted
with a complicated and changeable situation. It requires all leading
officials, especially senior officials, to make a scientific judgment of the
situation, properly handle all kinds of problems and contradictions and
implement the Party line, principles and policies," Jiang said at a
meeting attended by officials in Jilin, Heilongjiang and Liaoning provinces
on Sunday.
He said young people are
the future of the nation and urged a good job should be done in selecting
and training young cadres. Jiang described it as a task of strategic
importance for the Party and the State.
Grassroots organizations
are the basis of all undertakings of the Party and State. The party's
policies and principles will be implemented in a "down to earth"
manner in all regions and departments, Jiang said.
Young Party members and
officials should carry forward the Party's fine tradition and work style,
work hard and persevere and take into consideration the needs of the masses,
he said.
Referring to economic and
social development in China's Tenth Five-Year Plan period (2001-2005), Jiang
said that the upcoming five or 10 years will be an important period for
China's economic growth and be crucial to its development in the new
century.
We shall usher in a new
development phase, in which the Chinese people will lead a relatively
comfortable life. We must start from a higher point, push ahead with the
modernization drive, maintain a unity between speed and efficiency and
continue a fast economic growth, Jiang said.
Economic development in
the new century will be characterized by readjusting economic structures and
maintaining a sustained, rapid and healthy development of the national
economy, he added.
The next five to 10 years
will be a key period for China's economic restructuring. The country will
maintain fast growth while readjusting its economic structures, upgrading
the industrial structure, promote the efficiency of agriculture, industry
and service trade. During that time it will also give impetus to a
coordinated development of different regions and a virtuous cooperation
between urban and rural areas.
Jiang urged state-owned
enterprises to speed up reforms, establish a modern enterprise system at
large and medium sized enterprises and strengthen enterprise management in a
scientific way.
The country will also
enhance reforms in administrative departments, change the functions of the
government, separate the functions of the government from those of the
enterprises and reduce the government's intervention in economic affairs.
China will be active in
building an innovative system to make enterprises the backbone for technical
innovation and scientific progress. The development of non-governmental
technology-oriented enterprises will be encouraged, he said.
The president also
stressed the importance of improving people' s living standards in the
modernization drive, especially solving problems for needy residents in both
urban and rural areas.