Hong Kong Ta Kung Wen Wei Media Group:
The current pandemic prevention and control measures have caused some inconvenience in production and people's life. Some believe that the "dynamic zero-COVID" approach has slowed China's economic growth. What do you think will be the impact on the economy of this approach? Thank you.
Liang Wannian:
Thank you for your question. First, we need to clarify that the ultimate purpose of the dynamic zero-COVID approach is to make the utmost efforts to ensure people's health and protect their lives while sustaining social and economic development and ensuring normal production and daily life. The approach can be coordinated with economic development, and normal production and life. They are not contradictory. We have been implementing the general principle of the dynamic zero-COVID policy with a series of measures, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will affect economic growth or normal production and life. The reason lies in that the pandemic containment and economic development can be coordinated. They are both the primary objectives of the dynamic zero-COVID approach. There are also three subgoals that the policy aims to achieve: First, it aims to safeguard people's health and lives. Second, it aims to ensure economic development to protect the economy from the impact of the virus. Third, it aims to ensure people's normal work and life. As such, they are not contradictory.
We need to understand that it is the pandemic and the virus dragging down the economy. The pandemic impacts the economy of all countries in the world, which have been doing their best to minimize the impacts of the virus and pandemic with various policies and measures adopted in line with their own guiding principles. However, the differences in anti-epidemic philosophies, guiding principles, policies and measures, coupled with factors such as the response speed and implementation effectiveness, lead to different outcomes and efficiency of the pandemic containment efforts. It should be admitted that some of the measures adopted to fight the virus will cause temporary inconvenience in daily life and affect social and economic activities temporarily. But the targeted way is the priority in the general principle of the dynamic zero-COVID approach, which aims to synergize pandemic containment, economic development, and normal production and life in a targeted and balanced manner. In this regard, different areas need to consider their respective pandemic situation and local social and economic situation to make the approach work well and thereby effectively balance the relationship between pandemic containment and economic development, as well as people's normal work and life.
The last thing I want to say is how to understand the balance? The balancing process is a dynamic process guided by China's general concept and policy guidelines against the virus. So, we should understand the balance between COVID-19 prevention and control and economic and social development from a macro, collective and dynamic perspective. It is about dealing with the relationship between short-term and long-term considerations, between part and whole, and between individuals and groups. Specifically, while implementing specific strategies and measures, we may have inconvenienced parts of areas and people in the short term and made the economy of parts of areas suffer for a short time. Still, we have ensured the normal production and life of the broadest areas and people. I think it is cost-effective, also a balance. The Chinese government has been putting the goal of a well-balanced relationship between COVID-19 prevention and control and economic and social development as a priority. China has been striving to explore the approaches of balance and make efforts to do well in the balance, facing different epidemic situations and regions.
Thank you.
