With early signs that the national economy may be bottoming out, Chinese policymakers can surely be more confident about the stimulus plan they adopted to counter the global financial crisis and recession.
However, high hopes that China can be the first to recover from the current crisis do not mean that caution is not needed.
Emerging uncertainties like climbing unemployment across the country are a cause for concern. And the fight against the economic downturn is clearly far from over.
A drastic slowdown of the Chinese economy in the fourth quarter last year bears full testimony to the toll the global crisis has taken on China. The 6.8-percent quarterly GDP growth has dragged China's full-year growth to 9.0 percent, snapping a five-year streak of double-digit gains.
Yet, amid gloomy forecasts about the global outlook as well as China's growth prospects, the better-than-expected monthly data for December has already given Chinese policymakers confidence to claim that the country's counter-crisis measures are taking effect.
