China's economic restructuring : role of agriculture

Abstract

While China has achieved extraordinary economic success in the past decades, its economic structural risks have increased significantly as well. As Chinese top leaders have repeatedly emphasised, economic restructuring is a critical task facing China's economy. To restructure China's economy, the country needs to find a new engine for growth to replace the export and investment led growth model, address social inequality and protect the environment. The key approaches identified by the Chinese government include urbanisation, upgrading the manufacturing secotr and developing strategic industries. However, through in-depth analysis, this paper finds that the effectiveness of these measures remain in question as they fail to target at all the root causes of China's economic problems.