How to further implement the "scientific outlook on development" to tackle challenges faced by China will be one of the major topics of the upcoming "two sessions", as the battle against freak weather earlier this year has proved the urgency.
The First Session of 11th National People's Congress and the First Session of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), or the "two sessions", will be held early in March.
Chinese government has claimed "partial victory" in the battle against snow and ice disaster rarely seen in recent 50 years, highlighting the country's strong comprehensive national strength, and reflecting the truth that the country is still at the primary stage of socialism with the unbalanced development between city and countryside and relatively weak energy and transportation infrastructure.
Snowstorms have claimed 129 lives and causes 151.65 billion yuan of economic losses. Experts fret that a poor harvest caused by the extreme weather may lead to more price rises and agriculture development has again been listed as the government's priority work.
"The upcoming 'two sessions' is expected to be an important gathering for discussing and implementing "sound and rapid" economic development, because development was the key to deal with thorny issues, such as the weather disaster" said Zhang Mingpei, director of Agricultural Department under the Guangxi Prefectural Government.
The "scientific outlook on development", which was first initiated by General Secretary of the Communist Party of China's Central Committee Hu Jintao in 2003, takes development as its essence, putting people first as its core, comprehensive, balanced and sustainable development as its basic requirement, and overall consideration as its fundamental approach.
Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region was one of the most severely disaster-hit areas. "our win over the extreme weather should be mainly attributed to the rapid economic growth of China's economy during the past 30 years since the country's reform and opening-up," said Zhang.
Despite difficulties, it is widely judged that the opportunities for China's current development still outweigh its challenges. According to the report of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, China will have basically accomplished industrialization, with its overall strength significantly increased and its domestic market ranking as one of the largest in the world, and have attained its goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all aspects by 2020.
"At that time, China will be much more capable of dealing with a variety of emergencies, therefore, economic development will still be the core issue of the upcoming 'two sessions'," said Zhang.
As the world's economy growth becomes sluggish, how China, the world's fourth largest economy, would perform in its economic development this year will be heatedly discussed at the "two sessions".
Although China's GDP achieved a year-on-year 11.4 percent growth in 2007, some analysts believe its economic growth this year will be slower.
They think "to be a little bit slow" is not a bad thing. It will help prevent the country's economic growth evolving from rapid to overheating, while others deem that the interrelation between China's economy and the world's is more complicated than imagined by many.
But they agree on one thing; that is, more concrete and detailed measures on economic growth mode transformation should be made at the 'two sessions'.
Good signs have appeared at local people's congress. The Shanghai Municipal Government delivered a report to the city's people's congress earlier this year saying that in the coming five years, Shanghai will vigorously develop its service economy, considering that Shanghai abounds with professionals but lacks resources.
Environmental protection is another challenge. The 'two sessions' should give more feasible measures on how to realize the dual-optimization of economy and environmental protection, said Peng Zhenqiu, deputy of 10th National People's Congress.
The State Environmental Protection Administration (SEPA) on Monday announced that a regulation has been issued stipulating that highly polluting companies must pass environmental inspections when applying for an initial public offering (IPO) or re-financing, one major step toward a "green securities policy".
"But people expect more such policies to be suggested or discussed at the 'two sessions'", said Peng.