OECD Edges Up China Growth Forecasts

THE OECD HAS raised its forecast for China’s GDP growth this year by one-tenth of a percentage point from the 6.4% forecast it made last November. It has also raised its 2018 projection by one-fifth of a percentage point, to 6.3%. The 2017 forecast puts it squarely in line with the new official target of ‘about 6.5%’.

Its nutshell summary is:

Growth in China is expected to edge down further by 2018 as the economy manages a number of necessary transitions, including shifting towards consumption and services, adjustment in several heavy industries, working off excess housing supply and ensuring credit developments are sustainable. Demand is being supported by very expansionary fiscal policy, including via policy banks, which in turn is boosting private investment and trade. Producer price inflation has picked up strongly, but consumer price inflation remains low.

The OECD also notes that the rapid growth of private-sector credit and the relatively high level of indebtedness by historic norms is a key risk. Non-financial companies’ high debt levels provide particular vulnerability to a rapid rise in interest rates or unfavourable demand developments, it says. The report also advocates spending be directed at health and education and directed away from adding to financial risks.

The significant uncertainty about the future direction of trade policy globally is a key theme in the report, which makes the self-evident point that a roll-back of existing trade openness would be costly. Around one in seven jobs in China is linked to participation in global value chains.