BEIJING, March 5 (Reuters) - Premier Wen Jiabao delivers China's version of a "State of Union" address on Saturday. In a prepared text of his speech to the annual parliament session, Wen said that fighting inflation was the government's top priority and warned about the impact of loose monetary policies in wealthy economies. (For a full story, click on [ID:nTOE723043])
Here are the highlights:
Targets
-- China's GDP will grow by around 8 percent this year
-- China will keep consumer price inflation to about 4 percent this year
-- China's GDP will grow at an annual average rate of 7 percent over the next five years
-- China's GDP size will exceed 55 trillion yuan in 2015 (at 2010 price levels)
-- Rural and urban incomes will both increase by an annual average of 7 percent a year over the next five years in real terms
Price stability
"Recently, prices have risen fairly quickly and inflation expectations have increased. This problem concerns the people's well-being, bears on overall interests and affects social stability. We must, therefore, make it our top priority in macroeconomic control to keep overall price levels stable.
"We need to make the most of favourable conditions, such as an ample supply of manufactured goods and our abundant grain reserves and considerable foreign exchange reserves, endeavor to overcome the adverse effects of imported and structural inflation, cushion the upward pressure for costs of factors of production, and correctly guide market expectations to resolutely curb prices."
Boosting domestic demand
"Expanding domestic demand is a long-term strategic principle and basic standpoint of China's economic development as well as a fundamental means and an internal requirement for promoting balanced economic development.
"We will actively boost consumer demand. We will continue to increase government spending used to help expand consumption, and increase subsidies to low-income urban residents and farmers."
Property prices
"We will further implement and improve policies for regulating the real estate market and firmly curb the excessively rapid rise of housing prices in some cities."
Global challenges
"This year, our country still faces an extremely complex situation for development. The world economy will continue to recover slowly, but the foundation for recovery is not solid. Economic growth in developed economies is weak, their unemployment rates are and will remain high, and some countries are still under the threat of their sovereign debt crises."
Loose monetary policy in developed economies
"Major developed economies have further eased monetary policies, global liquidity has increased greatly, the prices of major commodities and the exchange rates of major currencies have become more volatile in the international market, asset bubbles and inflationary pressure have grown in emerging markets, protectionism continues to heat up, competition in the international market is becoming more intense, and there are still many unstable and uncertain factors." (Reporting by Ben Blanchard, Sui-Lee Wee and Zhou Xin; Editing by Simon Rabinovitch and Ken Wills)