High-ranking officials gathered in Beijing on Tuesday morning for the 2006 Central Economic Work Conference, aiming to analyze the country's current economic situation and map out major economic strategies and policies for 2007.

The annual event, first started over a decade ago, has served as a crucial sounding board for the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee to run the Chinese economy.

In a prelude to the conference, the CPC Central Committee Political Bureau convened a meeting last Thursday, stating 2007 is a crucial year for China's development and reform.

The meeting stressed that the nation should realize a healthy and fast economic growth, to foster a strong environment going into the 17th CPC National Congress.

The meeting drew out the general economic targets for the year to come, stressing that stable and rapid economic growth must be maintained, that substantial achievement must be seen when shifting to extensive growth pattern modes, and that new measures must be taken to ensure the people's interests.

Although great achievements have been made in national economic development in 2006, the first year of China's 11th Five-Year Plan period, some in-depth problems including an unbalanced economic structure, inefficient growth patterns and incomplete working mechanisms are far from being solved.

The Central Economic Work Conference will lay out specific strategies and resolutions for those problems relating to China's national economic development.

In certain areas, 2006 witnessed great progress in China's economic development. Forging ahead under its efficient macro-control policies, China has maintained a rapid growth rate in economic development and kept its commodity prices at a low level, said the meeting.

The country has sped up industry restructuring, and redoubled efforts to encourage self-innovation in all walks of life. In addition, China accelerated the development of social undertakings, such as education, health care and social welfare, thus improving the proletariat's living standards.

China's economy leapt 10.7 percent in the first three quarters, with the profit of industrial enterprises surging 30.1 percent over the first 10 months. Consumer prices only edged up 1.3 percent while fiscal revenue jumped 25.1 percent to 3.34 trillion yuan.

(Xinhua News Agency December 5, 2006)