China's economic restructuring to benefit long-term growth

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia -- China's economic restructuring, which causes a slowdown, will benefit the country in the long haul, an expert said here Thursday during a summit of the Group of 20.

Though there have been negative reports and analyses about China's slowdown, its fundamentals are fairly good with a 7.5-percent GDP growth rate being estimated, Yves Tiberghien, an assistant professor of political science with the Institute of Asian Research, University of British Columbia, told Xinhua on the sidelines of the two-day summit.

If you compare China with the United States and Europe or with some emerging countries, you will realize that, in fact, China is still doing the best, Tiberghien said.

It could be seen as "a controlled slowdown managed by the country, as part of the process of rebalancing," said the expert, who has frequently participated in G20 meetings.

The ongoing restructuring means that China strives to turn away from heavy investment in such sector as real estate, and reliance on energy and resources, moving toward a consumption-driven and environmentally-friendly growth path, Tiberghien said.

It will be a painful and difficult process, but China is moving along the right way, the professor said, adding that the world's second largest economy is going to reach its target of a 7.5-percent growth rate and "so far there is no major red flag."

As for positive spillovers of China's sustainable growth to the rest of the world, Tiberghien said that in the short run, China's ability to go through real estate and over-investment bubbles smoothly and make a soft landing will be a huge contribution to the world.

"Avoiding negative spillovers are the positive spillovers," he said.

In the long haul, China's rebalancing and restructuring to a growth model of high quality will have more positive impacts on global recovery and sustainable growth, Tiberghien added.

Meanwhile, the expert highly praised the constructive role China has been playing within multilateral mechanisms such as the G20 and BRICS, saying it is crucial to make policymakers realize that the public good is more important than private interests.

In this regard, China's advocating for the spirit of win-win cooperation and the principles of reaching common interest and common development has been the "right focus," as that is the position of a responsible great power, Tiberghien noted.

Yet, in a multipolar world, building a more robust system of global governance requires great efforts, such as creating new rules, information sharing, and interaction between policymakers and think tanks, the civil society as well as others players, he said.

As the current level of global governance is relatively low, to push it up to a higher level means "not just win-win and global cooperation but finding the right path to get there," Tiberghien noted.

Players need to build a "huge coalition" to work together to solve pressing problems facing the international community, he said.