Guangzhou has set an annual economic growth rate of 11 percent for the next five years as the southern China city shifts its focus from fast economic growth to improving people's livelihoods.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the annual meeting of the city's people's congress Monday, Guangzhou Mayor Wan Qing- liang said the ultimate goal was to improve the living standards of the city's 13 million residents.
Wan set 10 specific goals for improving people's living standards as the city worked to boost incomes, fight inflation and provide more affordable housing.
He said the city would introduce a series of preferential policies to allow residents to enjoy the fruits of fast economic growth.
Guangzhou's gross domestic product rose 13 percent from a year earlier to 1.06 trillion RMB (161.12 billion USD) in 2010, making it the third city after Shanghai and Beijing with economies of more than 1 trillion RMB.
The city economy doubled from 2005 to 2010, but growth of urban residents' per capita income lagged behind during the same period, with an increase of 67.6 percent, official figures have shown.
In his government work report, Wan set an annual growth rate of more than 10 percent for the per capita income of urban residents in the next five years.
The city plans to alleviate poverty in eight townships and 206 villages in the city's north by lifting average annual incomes to at least 5,000 RMB by next year.
Guangzhou would meanwhile complete 68,700 low-cost, subsidized homes and begin building another 43,000. By the end of the year, the city government hoped the program would have helped solve housing problems for 77,177 low-income families who registered in 2008.
Guangzhou also planned to spend 63 billion RMB expanding its railway system in the next five years by building three more metro lines taking the total to 11 and pushing ahead with constructing intercity rail links.
